Mole Negro con Cuitlacoche (Cuitlacoche Black Mole)

As I mentioned in my recent post quesadillas with Cuitlacoche this Mexican ingredient is consider a delicacy in Mexico and I had found out that this fungus that grows in maize is very common not only in Mexico, but in other countries like France and China, but we, Mexicans, are the only people that eat it.

So, I had some Cuitlacoche left and I wanted to cook something very special with it, but I didn’t know what, therefore I decided to do some research in the very handy Internet and I found this amazing recipe from Yuri Gortari, that I believe it does Cuitlacoche justice and also sounds very posh, fancy, interesting and, have I mentioned it is utterly delicious as well?

If you have never tried “Mole” before, well, this is your chance, and the good thing, it is very easy to make that YOU can make it yourself and impress your mates or girlfriends with a fancy Mexican dinner on your next gathering.

But, you might be asking yourself! What a heck is Mole??? Well, when somebody in England ask me what Mole is, I always tell them that it is like curry, the Indian dish, because it has the consistency of a sauce, but what it makes mole different from curry are its ingredients. The word Mole comes from the Nahuatl (the language from the Aztecs) Mōlli, which in Spanish means sauce. In Mexico, there are different types of Mole made, each one made with different ingredients, but the most popular is Mole Poblano, this type of Mole, created in Puebla, is made with lots of ingredients and is very well known internationally.

But this recipe is very simple with very little ingredients.

So, come on! Give this recipe a shot and see what you think!

Makes around 1 litre of fresh Mole

Prep 5 min

Cook 30 min

Ingredients

150 gr Cuitlacoche or Huitlacoche*
4 pasilla chillies, washed and deseeded
½ white onion peeled and cut
1 clove garlic peeled or 2 if they are small
1 ½ tablespoon maseca
Salt to taste or an organic chicken stock cube
Pinch of Dried epazote (optional)
250 ml boiled water
2 tablespoon rapeseed oil

Method

Put the pasilla chillies to cook with 250 ml boiled water for 10 min.

Then put them in a blender with just half the water where they were boiled, the raw onion and garlic and blend, pass the sauce through a sieve to eliminate any skin from the chilli.

Put the oil to heat at low heat in a saucepan, add the chillie sauce and start cooking it.

In a bowl put the maseca and add some hot water and stir until you get a runny consistency with no lumps and add it to the chillie sauce to thicken it, then blend the Cuitlacoche with the chicken cube or salt and add it to the chillie sauce, add the epazote and cook for 15 min at low heat and stirring from time to time.

Before turning the heat off, check if it is well seasoned.