Simple Red Pozole
Pozole is a brothy, chili-spiked soup from Mexico. I love red pozole, but traditional red pozole requires toasting and puréeing dried chiles to create a smokey broth, which takes time and labor. Here I use canned chipotle chilies in adobo sauce and fire roasted tomatoes to achieve that smoky flavor in a snap.
This dish serves 4 big servings, but I typically double the recipe for amazing leftovers.
This recipe can be cooked on the stove or in your instant pot, I’ll tell you how to do both. So get to work and get ready to taste authentic flavors.
Gather up these ingredients and get cooking muchachos.
2 tablespoons avocado or vegetable oil
1 large red or yellow onion, finely chopped
Kosher salt
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 Anaheim peppers, seeded and finely diced
1 can (14½ ounces) fire roasted tomatoes with juice
1 (7-ounce) can chipotle peppers in adobo sauce
1 teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon dried oregano
2½ pounds pork shoulder, fat trimmed off and cut into ½ -inch pieces
5 cups chicken broth or stock
1 (29-ounce) can white hominy, well drained
Juice of 1 lime (about 2 tablespoons), plus more as needed
Lime wedged, tortilla chips, diced avocado, crumbled cotija cheese, and cilantro, for topping
Here’s how it all comes together.
In a 6- to 8- quart heavy bottom pot or your Instant Pot, heat oil on medium heat (or on the sauté mode of the Instant Pot). Add the pork and sauté until opaque on all sides but not browned (about 3 minutes). You can do this in batches to ensure even cooking. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the meat to a bowl and set aside. If there is more than 2 Tablespoons of fat, discard the excess.
Add the onion and Anaheim pepper, season with a good pinch (½ teaspoon) salt and cook, stirring often, until the onion is softened and translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and cook, stirring, until slightly softened and fragrant, 2 minutes. Add the cumin and oregano and stir. Remove from the heat (turn off sauté mode).
Open the can of chipotles. Chipotles in adobo sauce are pretty spicy, but you can add fewer peppers if don’t like too much heat. It is important to use all the adobo sauce in the can to ensure loads of smoky flavor. To do this, remove all the the chiles from the jar scaping the sauce off each one to get as much of the adobo sauce behind as possible and placing the chilis on a cutting board. Add the adobo sauce to the pot. Chop 1 to 4 chiles until they are almost a paste. Add the paste to the pot and stir to coat the onion mixture. Note: The number of chilies determines the spice level: 1 chili makes a very mild soup and 4 chiles makes it pretty spicy. You can use all the chiles if you like it even hotter, but I would start with a few, you can always add more. Add the chiles to the pot and store remaining chiles in an airtight container. You can refrigerator them for 5 days and freeze them indefinitely.
Add the pork to the pot and stir until the pork it is well coated in the adobo sauce and chili paste. Turn the heat to medium (or sauté mode) and add the tomatoes, broth, and hominy.
On the stove, bring the pot to a boil and then reduce the heat to a low simmer. Cook for 45 minutes on on low or until the pork is cooked through. In the Instant Pot, close the lid and cook on high pressure for 18 minutes. Let the pressure release naturally for 5 minutes, then release remaining pressure manually. If there is excess fat on the surface of the soup, skim it off using a large spoon. Taste and add additional chilies to your liking. If you add additional chili (diced to a paste), cook for an addition 5 minutes to blend the flavors (use sauté mode for the Instant Pot).
Remove from the heat. Add the lime juice and taste; add more salt or lime juice as desired. Serve the soup in deep bowls topped with plenty of crumbled cotija cheese, diced avocado, and cilantro leaves. Provide lime wedges and tortilla chips for each person to squeeze and crush into their bowl. Enjoy.