RECIPE: Pork Pozole Rojo (from From Scratch by Michael Ruhlman)
I love, love this dish. You can add as much or as little of the slow-roasted pork as you wish; I like an even amount of hominy and pork. The key is using a high-quality chili powder—just make sure it’s fresh. Or combine a mix of your favorite dried chiles (ancho, guajillo, árbol, chipotle), toast them in an oven or dry skillet till crisp, dump out their seeds, and pulverize them in a spice or coffee grinder. Equally important is the hominy itself. You can buy it canned, but it doesn’t come close to dried corn that you soak and cook yourself. (See page 183 in From Scratch for information on turning dried corn into hominy.)
If you want an amazing breakfast the next day, heat up a bowl of leftover pozole, top with two poached eggs, and season with cayenne or piment d’Espelette.
Serves 6 to 8
1 cup/200 grams dried hominy, soaked in 6 cups/ 1.4 liters water for at least 6 hours, undrained, or 3 cups/ 500 grams canned hominy
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 large Spanish onion, cut into medium dice
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 tablespoons chili powder
1 tablespoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ teaspoon chipotle powder (optional)
1 (28-ounce/794-gram) can whole peeled tomatoes
½ recipe Slow-Roasted Pork Shoulder (page 212 in From Scratch), shredded between two forks
Leaves and thin stems from 1 bunch cilantro, for garnish
Fried corn tortillas or tortilla chips, for serving
If using soaked dried hominy, pour the hominy and its soaking water into a large pot and bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce the heat and simmer until the corn is tender, about 90 minutes.
In a large pot or Dutch oven, heat the oil over medium-high heat; when it’s hot, add the onion and salt. Cook until the onion is tender and even beginning to brown slightly, 10 minutes or so. Push the onion to one side of the pan and add the chili powder, cumin, black pepper, and chipotle powder (if using). Stir the spices and toast them briefly, then stir them into the onion.
Add the juices from the can of tomatoes, then add the tomatoes, squeezing them to crush them and expel their inner juices. Simmer for 20 minutes. Add the cooked (or canned) hominy, reserving its cooking liquid. Bring the pot back to a simmer, then stir in the cooked shredded pork. If you prefer your pozole looser, ladle in some of the reserved hominy liquid. Garnish with the cilantro and serve with crispy tortillas.
Note: Making your own tortillas is easy and worth the extra effort, especially if you buy corn tortillas at the store. Simply cut them into six triangles and fry. Do this for guacamole; season with salt and chili powders—they’re so much cleaner and more flavorful and have a thicker texture than bagged tortilla chips. If making them for a soup or pozole garnish, I cut them in strips, leaving them all connected at one end to make frying them easier.
If you want to go the From Scratch route, make your own corn dough by mixing a cup of corn flour, usually labeled masa harina in grocery stores, with ¾ cup/180 milliliters water and a pinch of salt, into a dough. Make about 8 balls of the dough and flatten them between sheets of plastic wrap beneath a skillet or Dutch oven. Toast them in a hot pan till nicely browned. When they’re cool, cut and fry. (Or use some slow-roasted pork shoulder to make tacos!)
An indispensable new cookbook from James Beard Award-winning food writer Michael Ruhlman
From Scratch looks at 10 favorite meals, including roast chicken, the perfect omelet, and paella—and then, through 175 recipes, explores myriad alternate pathways that the kitchen invites. A delicious lasagna can be ready in about an hour, or you could turn it into a project: try making and adding some homemade sausage. Explore the limits of from-scratch cooking: make your own pasta, grow your own tomatoes, and make your own homemade mozzarella and ricotta. Ruhlman tells you how.
There are easy and more complex versions for most dishes, vegetarian options, side dishes, sub-dishes, and strategies for leftovers. Ruhlman reflects on the ways that cooking from scratch brings people together, how it can calm the nerves and focus the mind, and how it nourishes us, body and soul.
For more information, click here.
