When October delivers the first real fall chill to the Chihuahuan desert of southern New Mexico, I take solace in the imminent return of pozole season at my favorite Las Cruces food truck, Tacos Romero.
Here the "posole" comes in only one flavor (rojo) and one size (quart styrofoam container). The savory, rich stock teems with fatty hunks of pork shoulder and buttery white hominy beneath a slick of oil stained red from dried chiles. Diced bits of radish, cabbage and white onion add bright crunch and piquancy to this comforting soup that never fails to warm me clean through to the soul.
Though I delight in the anticipation of Romero's short-lived pozole, I don't agree with this Southwestern notion of a finite soup season. Sure, when temperatures soar into the triple digits beneath a blazing sun, you might not crave a simmering cauldron of liquid, meat and veg. But soup has a weightier emotional load to carry — as the food equivalent of being hugged. Indeed, I can't think of many other foods that bear the responsibility of restoring us when we're sick, homesick, heartbroken, or even hungover. Nor, for that matter, can I name a culture without a significant soup tradition.
Pozole's own, somewhat grisly, origins purportedly date back to the Aztecs of pre-Hispanic Mexico. According to the Mazlatlán Post, it originated as a sacred offering to the Aztec god Xipe Totec in the hopes of a good harvest. Aztec warriors would kill and dismember a rival captive then toss him into the stewpot with salt and dried corn to prepare a ceremonial soup to be eaten by the Aztec priests, the king, and the warriors who — ahem — procured the meat. When the Spanish colonizers came along, they introduced pork, which the Aztecs started using instead.
The aromatic makeup of this simple pork soup changes depending on where you are in Mexico. On the Pacific and Atlantic coasts and in the lush mountains, pozole is often green — seasoned with a salsa of roasted poblanos, spinach, cilantro and tomatillo. The dish tends toward red in the more arid, red pepper-yielding areas of Jalisco and in the northern Chihuahuan desert.
"It's been perfected and changed through the years, but at the end of the day, when you see pozole recipes now, they're mostly really, really simple," says Jose Avila, a Mexico City native who's now chef and owner of James Beard Award-nominated La Diabla Pozole y Mezcal in Denver. "That's Mexican food; that's what it is. Simple, comforting food. You don't need crazy expensive, hard-to-get ingredients, just a few ones that are fresh and well balanced; and anyone can cook it."
"That's Mexican food; that's what it is. Simple, comforting food. You don't need crazy expensive, hard-to-get ingredients, just a few ones that are fresh and well balanced; and anyone can cook it."
You'll find pozole year-round at La Diabla because, well, it is a restaurant dedicated to this soup. But pozole also represents something much deeper to Avila. Though he hails from Mexico City (where pozole is traditionally red or pho-like white), his family's traditional recipe is red owing to his dad's grandmother's roots in Guadalajara, Jalisco. And when he was a teenager, the dish became emblematic of family.
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"My mom was a secretary who worked from 7 to 7," Avila remembers. "We would barely see each other. So my mom, having two teenagers at that time, it was hard to make sense of my brother and me. So instead of fighting and getting mad, she came up with this idea of, 'Let's have dinner together every Thursday to spend some time together.'"
She picked a pozoleria a few blocks from their house — "In Mexico City, pozolerias are as ubiquitous as taquerias." Sometimes she cooked red pozole, too, which has since become Avila's death-row meal.
Yet now that Avila is the one doling out year-round pozole hugs at La Diabla in all three colors of the Mexican flag (plus a vegan version and a beguiling black one made from burnt peppers, vegetables and spices), his relationship to the dish has changed.
"I still love it, but I don't crave it as I used to," he muses. Indeed, the choice to recreate the nostalgic flavors of his childhood in Mexico for a living meant an almost constant proximity to pozole — along with other beloved dishes like barbacoa and cochinita pibil — as he tweaked them ever closer to perfection.
"I had to do that a little bit of sacrifice to be around it, make it, and bring those dishes to people," he says. This in turn enabled him to conjure a powerful taste memory for others — perhaps a reminder of a home they miss, or a new comforting flavor when they need it.
"At the end of the day, that's what we do," he says. "And there's nothing cooler I would say than to do something for someone and then you become part of their life, in a way. There's something remarkable that stays there. There's a little bit of you that goes with each guest."
Maybe there's something to a finite soup season, after all — giving a few months of delicious comfort back to the chefs and owners who spend the rest of the year ladling it up for us.
Pozole (Photo courtesy of Maggie Hennessy)
By Jose Avila, chef/owner of La Diabla Pozole y Mezcal, Denver
Ingredients
For the salsa
5 dried guajillo peppers cleaned, seeded, open flat, and deveined
5 dried ancho peppers cleaned, seeded, open flat, and deveined
6 fat garlic cloves
1 medium white onion, coarsely chopped
1⁄2 tsp dried Mexican oregano
2 Tbsp grapeseed or vegetable oil
Salt, to taste
For the soup
2 lbs dry corn*
1 Tbsp food-grade slaked lime (calcium hydroxide) to create alkaline solution*
*Or 3 cans (15 ounces each) white hominy, drained and rinsed
2 lbs cubed pork shoulder
1 lb pork spare ribs or baby back ribs
1 white onion cut in quarters
8 large garlic cloves
Salt, to taste
Sliced cabbage, for garnish
Sliced radishes, for garnish
Diced white onion, for garnish
Cilantro leaves, for garnish
Lime wedges, for garnish
Directions
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Soak the ancho and guajillo peppers in just enough water to cover for 25-30 minutes, or until soft. Using a blender or food processor, blend peppers, garlic cloves, onion, and oregano, plus some of the water in which the peppers were soaking, until smooth. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high. Add the pepper puree and salt to taste, stirring constantly as it splatters. Reduce the heat to medium, and simmer for about 25 minutes.
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If you do the nixtamal, boil the dry corn with enough water the covers 2 time the amount of corn, lower the flame to a slow/medium heat and cook for 3 hours, remove from stove and rinse under cold water while with both hands you mix all the corn until the water is clear and corn is tender.
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Heat 4 quarts of water in a large stockpot. Add the pork meat, onion, and garlic. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat and let simmer, partially covered for 2 ½ hours, or until the meat is tender and falling off the bone. Season with salt to taste near the end of the cook time. While cooking, skim the top layer of foam and fat from the pot using a ladle. If necessary, add warm water to maintain the same level of broth in the pot. When the pork is tender, remove it from the broth, reserving the broth. Remove meat from the bones; discard bones, onion, and garlic from the broth. Shred meat (or leave in hunks if desired), and cover to keep warm.
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Using a strainer, add the salsa to the broth. Bring to a boil and add the meat. Simmer gently for about 10 minutes. Stir in the white hominy, and season with salt and pepper to taste. Simmer until heated through.
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Place the garnishes on a platter in the center of the table so each eater can customize their soup to their taste. Ladle the pozole into deep bowls and serve immediately.
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