Pozole: A Variant on a Mexican Classic

There’s more than one way to skin the proverbial pork.

Pre-topping pozole, captured using Hipstamatic. (Follow me if you so like.)

Pozole might be a traditional Autumn dish, but I have no qualms about preparing it off-season. And as I’m not a recipe prescriptivist, I gladly throw caution to the wind and substitute ingredients on a whim. In this case, I switched hominy with beans, and it worked perfectly well.

• 1 oz dried chiles of your choosing (I used anchos)

• 8 cups chicken broth

• 2 lbs boneless pork chops (or any other meat of your choosing)

• 3 tbsp vegetable oil

• 3 15 oz cans of hominy (I rebelliously used pinto beans this time around)

• 2 chopped onions

• 8 minced garlic cloves

• 3 tbsp minced fresh oregano

• 1 lime

Chiles

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Place chiles on a baking sheet and place in oven, middle rack. Bake until peppers puff—about 5-10 minutes.

3. Remove from oven and remove stems and seeds when peppers are cool enough.

4. Combine chiles and 1 cup of broth in a pot. Cover, and cook on high until broth boils. Remove from heat and let cool.

Pork

1. Season pork with salt and pepper.

2. Hear 2 tablespoons oil in a Dutch oven over medium-high heat until smoke forms.

3. Brown pork all around and then transfer to a plate.

4. Add hominy/beans to pot and cook while stirring. When hominy starts to darken (or beans start to soften), transfer it to a bowl.

5. Heat remaining oil in the empty pot over medium.

6. Add onion and cook until softened.

7. Stir in garlic.

8. Transfer onion mixture to a blender together with the softened chile mixture, and puree.

9. Combine remaining broth, puree, pork, oregano, ½ teaspoon salt, and ½ teaspoon pepper in empty pot. Bring to a boil.

10. Reduce heat to low, and simmer covered until meat is tender. About 1 hour.

11. Transfer pork to a plate. Add hominy/beans to pot and simmer covered for about 30 minutes.

12. Shred meat into bite-size pieces and return to pot. Cook until thoroughly heated through.

13. Remove from heat and add lime juice.

Et voilà: Done!

You can add most any type of toppings to the soup—onions, cilantro, and avocado are common. I’m more of a purist and enjoy the hearty soup as-is.