Without a doubt, “Mole” is one of the most representative specialties of Mexican Food. If you have not tried it, you have missed a huge part of Mexican cuisine.

For those of you who don’t know about it, let me briefly explain: Mole is a sauce made of many different ingredients, that are roasted, prepared and then grounded in order to combine them all in a savory paste and this sauce will later be incorporated to many different dishes as the sauce that will give it all its flavor.

One of the most common kinds of Mole is Mole Negro. Mole Negro is an incredibly dark brown sauce, and its preparation varies according to the region it is prepared. There is Mole Negro from Oaxaca (our personal favorite), and there is Mole Poblano. Both have mostly the same components, but the way each one of them is prepared changes a little bit and that gives them different tastes.

Mole Negro usually goes with chicken or turkey, but it is so versatile that it can go with any other meat or cooked vegetable. In a dish with Mole, the main flavor will always be Mole, so the other components of the dish are secondary. In addition, dishes with Mole usually are accompanied by rice.

Mole Negro is very difficult to prepare, because it is made from scratch. It has more than 20 ingredients, and all of these ingredients must be correctly roasted, cooked or dried, and then grounded in order to make the mixture that will give that perfect taste.

Since centuries ago, the preparation of Mole has been treated almost like a ritual, which starts many days before it is served, due to all the preparations that have to be made to all the components. Because of this, for many years Mole was a dish served only at very important events like annual parties, weddings, baptisms.

Traditionally, every family passed the recipe and procedure for making Mole from grandmother to daughter to granddaughter, so in the family always there was someone who can make it for the special family events.

Nowadays it is a lot easier to get Mole, because now many people who can prepare it very well, sell it at local markets or gourmet food places. Also, there are restaurants specialized in Mole so everyone can have a delicious meal made of Mole even if we are not at a wedding, special party and also without having spent the last days preparing it from scratch.

You can try Mole Negro in these very popular dishes:

Enchiladas

The real Enchiladas are prepared with Mole Negro, and they consist of tortillas heated with oil, then small pieces of chicken between each tortilla, and then a big serving of Mole covering it all, with some sesame sprinkled on top.

Romeritos

Very popular especially around Christmas or Easter. This dish has Mole as the main ingredient (of course) and it has a type of herb very common in Mexico called “Romeritos” (not related to the Rosemary spice), cooked potatoes and shrimp.