Holé Molé Recipe
Alright. Let’s get back in action. It’s been over a year and I, along with some
others, find/found it highly unacceptable that this site became basically
defunct. ‘Twas a function of many
components, and among MANY things, the lack of capability to acquire FABULOUS
ingredients was truly not helpful.
Fortunately, cooking for me is like riding a bike, although I sometimes
thought I needed to bring the training wheels back out. But I decided to rock with the Big Wheels
instead…nay, rock a vintage Triumph (that’s for you Gizzo) and get myself back
in the game. But enough with bikes,
let’s talk food. Football season is upon
us (GO GREEN), I’m in Northern Michigan, it is MAD CHILLY outside, and there
was some magical, wild venison loin in the freezer. Yes, the freezer, because that’s what you do
when you’re a hunter and have to process entire animals. (I’m not the hunter,
but luckily for me my NEIGHBOR IS!) Also, store-bought venison generally costs
a trillion dollars AND is farmed, which ain’t nobody got time for. For general cooking purposes though, this
dish could probably be done with a duck breast, or even a
not-too-gamey-lamb…but if you can get your hands on some deer, I highly
recommend t his!
So let’s talk venison for a minute. 1) it’s delicious. 2) it generally gets a flavor combination of
fruit and/or some type of sweet factor.
So, naturally my mind wandered to chocolate. And naturally, chocolate thoughts led me to
MOLE THOUGHTS! Mole negro to be
exact. The problem with legitimate mole,
though, is that it also takes nine thousand hours to make and quite frankly, is
a pain in the behind, BUT it is well worth the wait. Plan of action: all of the general components
of mole, but NONE of the time.
- 1 t fresh ground black pepper
- 2 oz dark chocolate (I used 74%)
- 1 t adobo sauce (from canned chipotles, more or less
- depending on your spice tolerance)
- 2 T white sesame seeds, toasted
- 2 T sliced almonds, toasted
- First step: preheat your oven to 250F (for your
- tomatoes!). Forewarning, the tomatoes
- take about an hour to cook.
- This recipe makes mole flavoring look easy! It takes about
- 1/16th of the time. Alright,
- while I know that a perfect mole calls for a few different dried chiles,
- reconstituted, pureed (ancho, guajillo, etc.), it’s a bit unnecessary for the
- spice rub, and the ancho chili powder manages to get the job done! Mix together the spices in a bowl and rub the
- spice onto each loin. Place the loins,
- covered, into the fridge. When I cook, I
- generally like to have my meats come to room temperature but venison is SO
- lean, and so tiny that you wouldn’t be able to get a nice crust, while still
- having the protein itself come out to a nice, seared rare temp without keeping
- it refrigerated.
- ONTO THE TOMATOES! Again. Easiest thing ever. And good for a
- multitude of other uses! Ready? Place tomatoes on baking sheet. Drizzle with
- olive oil. Sprinkle with salt and
- pepper. Place in oven. Done. The tomatoes
- will be done once they start to split.
- If done ahead, these can be reheated as well! Set aside until ready to
- plate.
- While the tomatoes are cooking, get started on your
- chocolate sauce. In a double boiler,
- makeshift or legitimate, get your chocolate to melting. You really don’t need much water in the
- bottom, just enough to ensure that it doesn’t evaporate completely! Bring the water to a boil, and place the
- chocolate into the top portion of your double boiler - stir until completely
- melted. Mix in the adobo sauce – again,
- you can use less than 1 T if you’re not too keen on spice, but taste as you go
- along. You definitely don’t want to
- cover up the flavor of the chocolate here! This can be made ahead of time and reheated to
- melt, but if you’re doing everything simultaneously, you can just lower the
heat to ensure the sauce doesn’t firm up.
Onto the cooking!!! I used a cast iron pan, but if you don’t
have that available and sauté pan will work out. Heat that bad boy up!!!!
You’re going to want your pan hot enough that you can really get that
aforementioned crust on it without overcooking the meat itself. Once your pan is SMOKIN’ hot, place those bad
boys in. I cooked mine for 2 minutes a
side, until that crust formed.
Immediately remove from the pan, and let rest about 7 minutes or
so.
While the loins are resting, get ready to plate! You don’t
want to overwhelm the venison too much with the chocolate sauce. Take a basting brush and make a nice clean
stroke on the bottom of your plate. It
should still be thick enough that it leaves a pretty solid amount of
sauce. Next, slice the venison loins –
I cut mine about 1 cm thick. Again,
since it is such a thin loin and quite heavily spiced, you wont want to cut it
really any thicker – the rub will overwhelm the flavor of the loin itself. Sprinkle each dish with sesame seeds, almonds,
cilantro, oregano, and cotija cheese and DINE AWAY!!!!
I figured this dish would be tasty, but it turned out better
than expected. And it really did taste
like mole!!! The flavors are pretty deep, and definitely appropriate for fall
weather. It warms you up from the inside
out! The “deconstruction” aspect of this
dish really is what makes it shine. I
love mole negro, but it is quite the heavy sauce, to say the least. This representation really allows the flavors
to single themselves out and shine, yet still work together. The tomatoes bring a perfect acidity to the
dish to balance out the depth of flavor that comes with the chocolate/adobo
sauce, and that sweetness from the chocolate helps to balance out the spice
from the rub, and the smokiness from the adobo sauce. The addition of the fresh herbs and cotija
help create a nice hot/cold juxtaposition and really brighten the dish up in
general. Overall a DELICIOUS dish! I
shared with my hunter neighbor (from whom the venison was from) and he couldn’t
stop raving about it for days. That
being said, I suggest you go ahead and make this! The fact that it is SO easy
really makes it unbeatable!