A HEARTY ONE-POT MEAL
Red mole makes this healthy Mexican beef and veggie soup crave-worthy
Red mole makes this richly flavored, healthy Mexican beef and veggie soup crave-worthy.
What do you crave when the weather turns chilly? At the top of my list is soup. But not just any soup: One that begins with a hearty homemade broth with plenty of veggies and just the right amount of protein — preferably meat — but I’ll take beans, too. Bonus points if it utilizes some dried chiles. ■ Today’s recipe, mole de olla, hits those marks and then some. A humble, one-pot meal delivered in a big steaming bowl, this soup is whole food at its best. It’s a richly f lavored vegetable soup traditionally made with beef (pork or chicken works, too, if you must) swimming in a broth enriched with red mole. Cheaper cuts of
tougher, bone-in meats shine here, as the long cooking time breaks down the connective tissues and renders the meat fork-tender.
The vegetables include thick wheels of corn on the cob that play in the broth alongside Mexican (or Italian) squash and pear-shaped chayote (another kind of Mexican squash that’s a nutrient powerhouse and tastes like a cross between a cucumber and a potato). Large chunks of carrots come to the party, too, as do green beans and, traditionally, potatoes, though I left them out since I didn’t have any on hand. But feel free to add some quartered boiling potatoes if you have them (red or white).
After the meat has had its first long cook with the onion and herbs, a rich chile-based sauce (mole) gets stirred into the pot to add even more complexity to the broth. The sauce utilizes various cooking techniques for its components to build up flavor. First, the tomatoes and tomatillos are roasted in the oven to bring out the fruits’ natural sugars slowly. While the tomatoes are roasting, thick rings of onion and fat cloves of garlic are sautéed in neutral oil until golden, then removed to a blender. Next, deseeded dried red chiles — here, a combination of nutty guajillo, mild but slightly chocolatey California, rich and sweet ancho, and smokey, spicy morita chiles — hit the hot, lightly oiled skillet. They kiss the heat just long enough to awaken their flavor before being tossed into a pot of boiling water until softened. The chiles, onions, garlic, tomatoes and tomatillos then get blitzed in a blender until smooth. The final step is to finish this simple mole by returning the sauce to the skillet and simmering with the addition of spices like cumin, Mexican oregano, coriander, and toasted and ground sesame seeds until slightly thickened and ready to add to the pot of simmering meat.
Because the vegetables have different cooking times, they’re added to the stockpot in stages, with the hearty corn going in first. Carrots and chayote (and potatoes, if using) are next. Lastly, the quicker-cooking squash and green beans join the party, simmered just until the squash is slightly softened and the green beans are crisp-tender.
I prefer to use large bowls to serve this hearty soup, adding the last essential layer of f lavor at the table — a generous squeeze of lime (don’t skip it!). Optional garnishes include fragrant chopped cilantro and crisp chopped white onion. Don’t forget warm corn tortillas to dunk into the soup. Or, as a lot of Mexicans do, fish out the meat and add it to the tortilla, rolling like a taco, before dunking it.
In conversations with people, I’ve found that the prevalence of corner taco shops serving the very tip of what Mexican food has to offer has made some think Mexican food is simplistic. A good carne asada taco or California burrito is, granted, always a welcomed yum, but the best of them still use different techniques to produce each component.
There are plenty of delicious quick and easy Mexican recipes to try at home — I’ve shared some here and many on my blog. But like most cuisines, Mexican food is also about the layering of f lavor, often employing multiple — but simple! — cooking techniques to do so. Each method plays a vital role in coaxing a specific reaction from an ingredient to build the overall f lavor profile of a dish.
Mole de olla is a fine example of how all the different techniques come together to deliver a soup that looks simple and homey but has a crave-worthy complexity that satisfies every time. I hope you don’t let the steps overwhelm you. I’ve tried to present them in an efficient way that makes sense and is easy to follow. So pour yourself a glass of wine or a hot cup of joe and spend a little time in the kitchen, creating a dish you’ll feel good serving your family.