Recreating Frida Kahlo's Oaxacan Black Mole From Taste

Hey, it's Dan,

and I'm here for a super secret conversation

about Chris Morocco.

Once again, we're gonna put Chris' super tasting abilities

to the test.

This is Frida Kahlo's Oaxacan black mole.

We're challenging Chris to replicate this exact dish

with every ingredient in just one day.

He'll be able to taste, touch, and smell it,

but at no point will he be allowed to see this dish.

At the end of the day,

we'll come back and taste his final creation

and I'll be the judge.

[dramatic music]

All right, here we go.

[mellow music]

Ah, like barbecue sauce but with, like, star anise.

Wow, okay. There's just so much sauce here.

I'm getting, like, really strong chili component,

but then there's like a fruitiness,

a sweetness, and a tomatoeyness.

I think there's a strong dried herb element in there.

It's like a dried oregano.

There could be some black pepper in there too.

Underneath there,

there's like a very firm something.

Oh, okay.

We have a chicken leg.

And I just wanna separate out some of these elements

to see if I missed anything on this plate.

I mean the sauce itself is just wildly complex.

Oh, it's really good.

Is giving me, like, a little bit of like cocoa, nuts, seed.

And it's like my worst nightmare

of there being so many different subtle flavors

all piled up.

Let's set that nightmare aside

and let's move over to the chicken.

It's a little bit firmer than I'm expecting.

It's pretty, like, neutral and chickeny.

It's not really giving me much at all.

The knee bone doesn't really wanna flex that much.

It feels like the chicken

was kind of just sort of straight up roasted,

with the sauce lad over it.

To me, this feels like extremely classic Mexican cooking.

Mole is just an archetypal dish.

They're known for having a lot of ingredients.

This is pretty much a worst case scenario.

[dramatic music]

Dear diary.

So I'm thinking for nut, it's peanut/almond.

Seed wise: pepitas, sesame seeds.

I think there is a dried chili element.

I think ancho, pasilla, chipotle.

I need, like, all of those chilies to kind of work together.

I could put cocoa powder.

And then for protein, chicken leg quarters.

I've got 25 things on this list.

Given my track record

of being like a solid B to C student,

we could be looking at a 40 ingredient dish here,

no problem.

So somebody's gonna shop for these ingredients

and bring 'em back and I'll have my first shot.

[dramatic music]

Okay, so ingredients are here.

There's so many things.

It's a little bit head-spinning

to see it all laid out like this.

Why don't we toast off some chilies

and get them rehydrating.

Toast off nuts, seeds, spices,

sweated out aromatics.

Tomato will be one of the last things that goes in.

Rehydrated chilies need to be pureed,

added to the sauce at some point,

and bring it all together.

And not least of all is our friend Mr. Chicken.

We may just throw this one in the oven.

Where we're gonna start

is pick a nice mix of dried chilies:

pasilla, morita, ancho, guajillo.

The seeds get a little bit bitter,

and you gotta get all that plus the stem out of there.

Pasilla us gonna give me some of the leathery notes.

Morita is gonna give me smokiness and heat.

Ancho is gonna give me fruitiness

and kind of like medium complexity.

Ad guajillo is gonna kind of give me bulk

without a ton of heat.

I'm toasting the chilies,

deepens their flavor a little bit.

You see them kind of like changing shape a little bit

as they heat up.

But I'm just thinking, like,

a number of things

feel like they need to be toasted off here,

and why not the chilies as well?

If you were to blend them up right now,

they would stay in distinct pieces,

kind of like chili flakes added to a dressing,

but instead we're hydrating them

so that when we puree them

they turn into a relatively smooth sauce.

Next step, let's think about toasting some nuts.

You know, toasting in a skillet,

you do it because it's faster.

Trying to push this process along

just 'cause we have so many ingredients to get through.

And then let's move on to sesame seeds.

I felt the texture of seeds.

And I feel like the body

of the sauce was blitzed out nuts and seeds.

How's that the recipe going?

Recipe's fine.

Yeah? Yeah, recipe's fine.

Your voice got really high when you said that.

Yeah, I know.

I hit a falsetto.

Dan's shoot got canceled in India,

so now he's just like around,

like kind of just like a bitter teenager whose, like,

house party kind of fell through.

All right, so pepitas,

more commonly or less commonly known as pumpkin seeds.

So coriander and cumin seeds.

Coriander adds, like, a real citrusy note.

Cumin is just like earthiness.

If the chicken is cooked on the stove top

and cooked some amount of way in the sauce...

But a sauce with that level of viscosity to it

is gonna wanna stick and burn.

Whereas throwing it into the oven is a little bit random

but maybe appropriate.

It's going in at 425.

I think, like, when in doubt,

go with, like, white onion,

especially for Mexican cuisine.

This is gonna be for the aromatic base of the sauce.

All right, I'm just gonna let that go for a minute

while I chop up some garlic.

Onion and garlic make the world go around.

I'm gonna grind up some of these spices

So I'm gonna use roughly half

and I'm just gonna grind them up.

So that's the cumin and coriander.

This is dried Mexican oregano.

Do I wanna add the cocoa powder now?

Maybe, right?

I feel like that is probably

the most common form of, like,

chocolate added to a mole.

So this is traditional passata.

It's just a concentrated tomato puree.

The tomato's gonna help bring up some of the acidity.

There's also like a sensation of kind of tomatoeyness,

like a really soft form of acid.

I want it to be really cooked out

till the fat is practically separating.

It tastes good.

Even the cocoa, it's like very integrated in there.

I think this aromatic base is kind of ready to go.

So there are chilies.

And you can see the liquid that's coming off of them,

just like how dark it is.

If you're looking for hydration

in your ultimate recipe,

it's certainly better than water.

It's like giving you some of that liquid essence

of the chili peppers.

I've got some chicken broth.

So I'm gonna do ready-to-go roasted peanut,

which just had way superior flavor

and texture versus the raw peanut

that we tried to kind of rough and ready

in the hot skillet.

It just like tastes like nothing.

It tastes like, like [beep] ear wax.

So anyway, I've got a couple tablespoons of toasted pepitas,

toasted sesame seeds as well.

Blitz these things up a little bit

before I introduce the chili

just so we can start the pureeing process.

There's a little bit of texture.

Just that little amount of chili rehydrating liquid

is giving us some heat.

And then the peanut just provides

just like that grounding,

overall kind of savory depth.

And what peaks out up above is the toasted sesame

and pepita.

So I wanna add all of these chilies.

You only live once, right?

Let's see where we get just pureeing this now.

[blender whirring]

So obviously massive transformation, right?

It's now in this kind of like brick red world.

It's...

[explosion booms]

[Chris clears throat]

It's a little intense.

And there's not even, like, any salt in there,

which is not great.

But we also don't have

any of our cooked out aromatic base here;

a lot of our sources of sweetness.

You know, our herbs,

our spices is gonna round out that chili mixture.

I'm gonna re-taste the sauce

now that it's got the aromatic base in it.

It's like we're a long way off guys.

It's too hot, it's too bright.

We need more cocoa powder.

I'm gonna throw some sugar in here.

Just not getting like, the, sweetness.

I think we're just missing a little bit more pepita

and sesame and even peanut as well.

[blender whirring] [lively music]

The more I put cocoa with the sugar

and the more salt in there,

it just keeps pulling the flavor down and down, deeper,

richer in a good way.

I'm a little shaky on the relationship

between the chicken and the sauce and the original dish.

I can imagine like chicken braised in mole,

which was not what I experienced.

We have this, like, slightly bright sauce, right?

Technique that I've seen

but I've never personally attempted before

is called scalding a sauce.

So, like, basically, like,

you heat a new pot of oil

and you put your puree into that pot

as a way of deepening and melding the flavors.

Whoa.

[funky jazz music]

Danger.

[beep]

Anyway, I think that's like, that's enough, like,

innovation for the day.

[upbeat music]

I'm thinking it's chicken with the sauce on top

and then nothing else.

This is my first attempt at chicken mole.

I mean, it's like...

Look, there's an honesty to it, right?

Scores.

Ingredients, 50.

Technique, 50.

Appearance, 65.

And taste, I mean, I'll give this like a 60.

It's bringing me more to, like, spicy peanut sauce.

It's in the same universe,

but I think I could have done better.

All right, here are my actual scores.

Fascinating.

I mean, this is honestly, like,

significantly better than I expected.

As much as I wanna sit here and expound,

why don't we just taste the original dish again

and then have a conversation about it.

[dramatic music]

Heavy is the head that wears the mask, you know?

All right, here we go.

Gosh, it's like it's this sweetness.

This is just a sweeter, cleaner flavor.

And I'm really getting pops of sesame seed in there.

Compared to what peanut did in my version,

staying very faint,

the peanut could come out entirely.

I wonder if we can take the pepita out as well.

This question of like warm spices, I don't know,

there could be cinnamon in the spice mixture

or you could be using, like, Mexican chocolate,

which would have cinnamon in it.

It's so aromatic, but I'm,

I feel like I'm kind of, like I'm missing it.

So brightness,

I am wondering about a blistered tomato in there,

maybe the onion as well.

I mean, certainly a technique that I see elsewhere

in Mexican cuisine.

I don't know.

There's still, like,

this question of like the interplay

between the chicken and the sauce.

Like, this chicken is really firm.

A lot of, like, unrendered fat under the skin.

It's not, like, brazey, shreddy.

And it's kind of driving me crazy.

I have some meaningful thoughts.

I don't know that it's, like, gonna quite get me there,

but I think I'm good.

[dramatic music]

Here are my ingredients for this round.

The main addition here is, instead of cocoa powder,

Mexican hot chocolate, right,

which has got...

Cinnamon's not listed, but it says artificial flavor.

And God, I hope there's cinnamon in there.

Only Abuelita knows what's actually in there.

[tense music]

I'm gonna try a different technique

in terms of building the sauce.

Blistering some tomatoes, quartered onion,

whole cloves of garlic in their skin.

A little coating of oil on these

just to try to get more depth on them

and see if we can get some real nice char.

Going to all pasilla and ancho.

I just worry that the morita just get real hot,

so I'm hoping we can pull the flavor down.

I don't think I'm gonna toast them this time,

just getting them rehydrated.

So we are toasting sesame seeds.

It really develops so much more character.

This is cumin, coriander, and black pepper.

Veg are done.

I'm gonna transfer them to the blender.

I'm gonna throw the chicken on that sheet tray

and I'm just gonna broil it.

So I can throw some of these cloves of garlic in there,

chilies are going in here.

I need to get some of our spices in

as well as our oregano, sesame seeds.

[funky jazz music]

Still a little on the spicy side, to be honest.

Wouldn't suck to have a little bit more liquid here.

Flavors are a little jangly, a little hot.

Some sugar will definitely be appreciated here.

I just need to get this hot,

where I can whisk some chocolate into it.

Hershey's cocoa powder, it's not super chocolatey.

I don't hate this consistency;

I like the way it's kind of piling up.

So I'm adding the whole sesame seeds now.

Let's see where we're at.

Honestly, it's unbelievable, like,

what a difference that solid Mexican chocolate makes.

I don't feel anything about this chicken.

I do feel something about this sauce.

I love it.

This is my second attempt at the dish.

I think we got a little bit closer,

and that's what this is all about.

Ingredients, God, I'd love to be at a 70.

Technique, we changed a lot.

I'm gonna go with 70 again.

Appearance, we were at a 90 before.

Wow.

I'm gonna just, like, stick with 90.

And taste, I guess we'll find out.

I would love to believe that I got to an 80.

Very different feel to this.

Very different composition of the sauce.

I think I'm ready to present this to the judge

and find out what I actually got.

Why is Dan moving over into the-

Are you starting to realize

what's happening? Judge's position?

Come on, Chris.

I stand- It's been me the whole time.

Stop. It has not.

It has been me the whole time and you just

didn't realize it. No!

This is a freight train headed in one direction.

Chris, may I present to you Frida Kahlo's

Oaxacan black mole.

Is that [beep] turkey?

This is not a giant Turkey,

but turkey nonetheless,

which is something that's common in Oaxacan cooking.

I totally misjudged the size. That's so crazy.

What are we looking at here?

I mean-

Well, yeah. Okay.

What, did you like find the smallest chicken

you could get and put it in here?

Apparently this was the dish

that was served at Frida's wedding.

We'll give Frida credit for this one

though she probably didn't make it herself.

But how did you prepare your turkey?

Sorry, chicken. Well, I prepared my turkey

using chicken.

Yeah. I just threw the chicken

under the broiler. Okay.

The whole turkey, which we broke down into parts,

goes into a pot of water,

along with some aromatics,

and basically spends its entire time cooking in there.

I mean, it's just waffling in the middle of, like,

cooked but not fully tender,

surprisingly kind of bland, whereas, like,

the sauce is like the event.

We had a blend of three chilies in this dish:

it's the cascabel, mulato, and pasilla chili.

Okay, what did you do to these chilies?

I stemmed and seeded the chilies

and then rehydrated them in hot water.

Okay, so the chilies are toasted.

I toasted them dry when I toasted them.

Okay. Did she toast in oil?

Big ingredient drop here: lard.

Lard is all over this recipe.

Again, we have aromatic vegetables

going into that lard

and then the tomatillos are added raw.

Okay. Obviously

[bought laugh]

I roasted my tomato, onion, and garlic,

just for what it's worth.

Oh, great.

That's good for a few points.

[Chris deeply exhales]

So then I think you broke this recipe down

a little more than it needed to.

What happens... [chuckles]

Put the knife down, Chris. [laughs]

[tense music]

One other thing about the texture of your sauce

that's probably been driving you a little bit crazy,

a big part of the thickening agent

is the addition of sort of like a stale tortilla

in addition to bread that is put into this.

[Chris deeply exhales]

One of the other categories of spice, I'll say,

if we're just looking up at our ingredients here

and doing a quick like X, X, X, X, X,

which we might be doing right now.

No, there's not room

'cause there's two of us in frame.

I'll move over-

There's two of us in frame- And then we can have

our box. So there isn't room.

Can we get the Xes?

There's not room!

Can we get a sound effect for the Xes?

Graphic person, there's just not room.

Okay. Let's give these a taste.

It's honestly incredible you got anything out of that.

It tastes like a thousand things at once.

Yeah.

Let's try a bite of yours.

[Chris] Okay.

Okay, first of all, I like yours better.

That's not what we're here for.

Stop.

Big hit to the face here.

Yeah, mine's like keyed up.

It's like it's-

Every spice is turned up.

Boom, boom, boom. The heat is turned up.

Everything that's in there kinda comes through.

Report card.

[Chris] Hmm.

Ingredients, you gave yourself a 70.

This one's gonna hurt a little bit.

I'm gonna give you a 57.

[Chris deeply inhales]

Don't panic.

Oh. That one

is in the low range.

Going by

what was missed here. It's warranted.

It's well learned. I know.

But still

I can't have the commenters looking at all the things

and then being like, He was too generous.

Oh, God forbid that people think you're nice.

Moving on to technique.

You gave yourself a 70, we'll give you a 70 also.

The cooking of the meat, the toasting in the lard.

We'll give you a 70 on that. Hmm. That's fair.

Appearance, you gave yourself a 90,

we're gonna give you a 92.

Really the big differences

just being, like, size and the seeds on top.

And lastly, taste.

You gave yourself an 80,

I'm gonna give you a 75.

Yeah, that's fair.

They were pretty substantially different,

but it's [beep] delicious.

I would sit down and eat this for dinner anytime.

Overall, that takes you to a 74.

That's a solid C.

Yes. I think you walk away

saying, Hey, I learned a lot.

Mole is hard. You did really great.

This was virtually impossible.

I love you. I'm gonna catch a train.

Bye. Thank you so much

for covering.

Honestly, I feel fine.

You know, there's a lot going on in there.

A lot of new information,

a lot of new techniques in there for me.

The fact of it being Frida Kahlo's recipe

just adds to the mystique and the seemingly, you know,

kind of randomness of it.

But that's okay, you know?

It's like it's, it's her POV.

And I certainly learned a lot

from going through the exercise.

I have to run from my train, though. [laughs]

[quirky music]

Look what I did,

look what I did so I can see it whenever I want.

Oh, God. There's you.

[Chris] Dan, I'll never wear

that sweatshirt. A loyal follower of Gru.

I will never wear that sweatshirt at work again.

I hope you're happy.

And you dictated my choice

of all black today. It looks great.

[lively music]