How To Make Oaxacan Molé Almondrado
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On a recent trip to Oaxaca City we discovered this Molé Almondrado. We hadn’t encountered this particular molé before so it was a pleasure learning to make it. The almond and chocolate combination in this molé is heavenly! We have used it to make Lacquered Chicken among other things.
This recipe is naturally gluten free.
Watch A Video
Here is a video of 2 Cooks in the Kitchen making Molé Almondrado:
Ingredients For Molé Almondrado:
- 3 Ancho Chiles – seeds and stems removed, torn into pieces.
- 4 Guajillo Chiles – seeds and stems removed, torn into pieces.
- 2 Pasilla Chiles – seeds and stems removed, torn into pieces.
- 2 Morita Chiles – seeds and stems removed, torn into pieces.
- 1 Cup Almonds – peeled
- 2 Corn Tortillas
- 3/4 lb Tomatoes – cut into pieces
- 1 Plantain – sliced into 1 inch rounds
- 1/4 Onion – cut into pieces
- 4 Cloves Garlic – peeled
- 4 Cups Chicken Broth
- 1/4 Cup Raisins
- 1 Tablespoon Cumin
- 1 Tablespoon Cinnamon
- 2 Tablespoons Oil
- 1 1/2 Ounces Unsweetened Chocolate
Prepare the Chiles
Remove the seeds from all the dried chiles and tear them into smaller pieces. We have found it easier to use a pair of kitchen shears to cut the stem off and then cut down the length of the chile. This makes it easy to get at all the seeds.
Peel the Almonds
To peel the almonds easily we are going to blanch them in hot water. We’ll get a saucepan of water boiling, remove it from the heat and add the almonds.
The almonds need to soak for about 10 minutes until the peels start to come off easily. You can just squeeze the almonds and the peels come right off. We had to work on our aim though, the almonds pop right out!
Toast the Almonds
We’ll put the almonds and the tortillas on a baking sheet and put them under the broiler. You’ll want to stir the almonds occasionally and turn the tortillas over. We’ll broil these ntil they get a good amount of color, about 15 to 20 minutes.
Broil the Chiles, Tomatoes, Plantains, Onion and Garlic
We will line a baking sheet with parchment paper, spread our pieces of chiles, tomatoes, plantains, onion and garlic out and broil them until they cook a little and get some color. We’ll turn them from time to time so they cook on all sides. You’ll find that the different things get done at different times so remove them from the pan as they finish cooking.
Our chiles got done first, followed by the plantains. The tomatoes and onions took a little longer, about 20 minutes to show a little color. We’ve processed the dried chiles a number of different ways in our molé recipes but this is the only one where we broil them. We will give a word of caution that this method can fill your kitchen with capsaicins. If you are sensitive, like Kelly is you can sweat them in a dry frying pan instead.
Boil the Chiles and Vegetables
Now we’ll set the plantains aside for now and put the chiles, tomatoes, onion and garlic in a saucepan with 2 cups of the chicken broth. We’ll let this boil for 10 minutes before we take it off the heat and let it cool a little.
Blend the Chiles and Vegetables
Once the pan has cooled a little we’ll pour all the contents into the blender. We’ll blend this until it is really quite smooth, letting the blender run for a couple minutes. You should have enough liquid from the pan but if not, you can add a bit more chicken broth.
Strain the Chile Sauce
Next we will push the chile sauce through a fine mesh strainer. This is an important step to remove the tiny pieces of chile skin that are left. The longer you blend it the less you have to strain out, and the easier it is. We find using a silicone spatula works best to push the sauce through the strainer. We’re going to be using the blender again right away so you don’t need t clean the chile saucer out of it.
Put the Chile Sauce in the Blender.
Now we have prepared all our ingredients and we are ready to assemble our molé. We start this by putting the chile sauce into the blender.
Put Everything Else In the Blender.
Now we’ll put our toasted almonds, plantains, raisins, cumin, cinnamon, tortillas (broken up), and the rest of the chicken broth into the blender. We want to really blend this to break the almonds down as much as possible. You’ll always have small pieces of almond in your molé but we don’t want to strain them out. That takes away too much flavor. So we just try to blend this as smooth as we can.
Cook the Molé Almondrado.
Now we’ll heat some oil in a stock pot and cook the molé. We use about 2 tablespoons of coconut oil but any cooking oil will do.
Add the Chocolate
Once the molé is in the pan we will add in the chocolate. We have found 1 1/2 ounces to be perfect for this recipe. It gives a subtle underlying note of richness to the sauce. You can adjust for your taste.
We’ll cook this for about 45 minutes to marry and deepen all the flavors and our molé almondrado will be done. We have made lacquered chicken with molé almondrado but we think one of the smoother molés works better.
Other Molé Recipes In This Series:
- Molé Colorado
- Molé Verde
- Molé Amarillo
- Classic Molé Rojo
- Easy Molé Rojo
- Molé Coloradito
- Molé Chuchilo Negro
- Molé Manchamanteles
- Molé Poblano
- Oaxacan Molé Negro
- Quick and Easy 30 Minute Molé
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Oaxacan Molé Almondrado
Equipment
- Blender
Ingredients
- 3 Ancho Chiles – seeds and stems removed torn into pieces.
- 4 Guajillo Chiles – seeds and stems removed torn into pieces.
- 2 Pasilla Chiles – seeds and stems removed torn into pieces.
- 2 Morita Chiles – seeds and stems removed torn into pieces.
- 1 Cup Almonds – peeled
- 2 Corn Tortillas
- 3/4 lb Tomatoes – cut into pieces
- 1 Plantain – sliced into 1 inch rounds
- 1/4 Onion – cut into pieces
- 4 Cloves Garlic – peeled
- 4 Cups Chicken Broth
- 1/4 Cup Raisins
- 1 Tablespoon Cumin
- 1 Tablespoon Cinnamon
- 2 Tablespoons Oil
- 1 1/2 Ounces Unsweetened Chocolate
Instructions
- Remove the seeds and stems from all the dried chiles and tear them into smaller pieces.
- Blanch and peel the almonds. Heat some water in a medium saucepan. Add the almonds and let them soak for 10 minutes, until the skins come off easily. Remove the skins from all the almonds.
- Put the almonds and the two tortillas on a baking sheet and place under the broiler. Stir the almonds and flip the tortillas so they get toasted on all sides. You want to get the tortillas fairly dark so about 15 to 20 minutes.
- Spread the chile pieces, tomatoes, plantain, onion and garlic on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Put them under the broiler. Remove them as they get cooked and before they burn. The chiles will get cooked first, the plantains next and the tomatoes last.
- Setting the plantains aside, put the chiles, tomatoes, onion and garlic in a small sauccepan with 2 cups of the chicken broth. Bring to a boil and let boil for 10 minutes. Remove from heat and let it cool a little.
- Put the cooled chile and vegetable mixture into a blender along with all the liquid in the pan. Blend until very smooth. Push the resulting sauce through a fine mesh strainer.
- Put the strained chile sauce back in the blender. Add the almonds, plantains, raisins, cumin, cinnamon, tortillas (broken up), and the rest of the chicken broth into the blender. Blend until as smooth as you can get it. There will still be small pieces of almond in the sauce.
- Heat 2 Tbls of oil in a stockpot. Pour the contents of the blender into the pot.
- Add the chocolate. This is most authentic with unsweetened chocolate, although semi-sweet would also work. It would just make a sweeter sauce. We have found 1 1/2 ounces to be perfect for this recipe.
- Cook for 45 minutes.
