Red Pozole

Pozole Rojo

Serves 12 Preparation Time: 20 minutes (plus making white pozole) Cooking Time: 30 minutes Chile puree can be made up to 5 days ahead, covered, and refrigerated; pozole can be made up to 4 days ahead, covered, and refrigerated

Red pozole is a Mexican party in a bowl. Following tradition, when Daniel and I married, we served our guests pozole rojo—which comes from the state of Jalisco, where it is known as tapatío—at our tornaboda, or “after-wedding party.” A Mexican wedding can go on for hours. Day turns into night as people eat, sing, and dance, and sometimes the night turns into day, and there are always many guests barely standing toward the end. Right before the party finally winds down, steaming bowls of pozole are brought out to make everyone right.

This is a version of our wedding party pozole, garnished with the same options as for the white pozole. And as with the white version, please do serve it with a generous squeeze of lime.

Conveniently, the soup tastes even better made ahead and reheated.

• Chile Puree
• 2 ancho chiles, rinsed, stemmed, and seeded
• 3 guajillo chiles, rinsed, stemmed, and seeded
• ¼ cup chopped white onion
• 3 garlic cloves
• Pinch of ground cumin
• 2 whole cloves
• 1 teaspoon kosher or coarse sea salt, or to taste
• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
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• White Pozole
• Kosher or coarse sea salt
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• Accompaniments, as desired
• 5–6 limes, halved
• 10 radishes, halved and thinly sliced
• 1 head romaine lettuce, leaves separated, rinsed, dried, and thinly sliced
• ½ cup chopped white onion
• Dried ground chile, such as piquín, or a Mexican mix, such as Tajín
• Dried oregano, preferably Mexican
• Tortilla Chips or Tostadas
• Refried beans, homemade or store-bought

1. To make the chile puree: Place the chiles in a medium saucepan, cover with water, and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Simmer for 10 minutes, or until softened and rehydrated.
2. Place the chiles, along with ¾ cup of their cooking liquid, the onion, garlic, cumin, cloves, and salt in a blender or food processor and puree until smooth. Pass the puree through a fine-mesh strainer into a bowl, pressing on the solids with the back of a wooden spoon to extract as much liquid as possible.
3. Heat the oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat until hot but not smoking. Add the chile puree and bring to a boil, then simmer for 6 to 8 minutes, partially covered with a lid, stirring occasionally, until thickened. Remove from the heat.
4. Heat the white pozole in a large pot over medium-high heat until it is simmering. Stir in the chile puree and cook for 20 minutes. Taste and adjust the salt.
5. Serve the pozole in soup bowls, with the garnishes in bowls on the table so your guests can customize their pozole.

Guajillos, one of the most commonly used dried chiles throughout Mexico, are widely available in the United States. This chile is a crowd-pleaser, as it has an amiable, savory flavor without a big punch of heat at the end—guajillos are not spicy. Their look and flavor are quite refined: elegantly long and pointy, with a gorgeous maroon color and a smooth, shiny skin (see the photo). But they are also sturdy and tough, so much so that they are commonly strained out when used in sauces.

Mexicans use guajillos in many ways: in table sauces, in stews and meat dishes, in moles and soups. The chiles can be ground or simmered and then pureed or mashed. Sometimes they are pickled and stuffed.

To get them ready to use, rinse or clean with a dry towel and remove the stems, seeds, and veins. Toast the chiles on a hot comal or in a heavy skillet for 10 to 15 seconds per side, until the skin is brownish and opaque, taking care not to burn them, or they will taste bitter. Once toasted, proceed with the recipe, rehydrating the chiles as directed. As with anchos, the simmering or cooking liquid that the chiles are rehydrated in is used both for color and flavor.