🇲🇽 Mexico · Guerrero (also attributed to Michoacan, Sinaloa, Aguascalientes, Puebla)
ElopozoleMexican fresh corn soup
A pozole-style soup in which fresh tender corn replaces hominy, cooked with chicken or pork, squash, green beans and epazote, seasoned with guajillo chile.
Origin and history
Elopozole, from elote (fresh corn) and pozole, is a traditional dish of Guerrero, served in Tixtla and Chilapa and in Guerrero eateries in Mexico City. A red version from Chilapa was recorded in a recipe collection of Mexico's National Institute of Indigenous Peoples (INPI). It is cooked like a pozole but with tender corn instead of hominy, and a similar soup is made in Puebla.
Make it at home
- Makes
- 6 servings
- Total time
- 1 h 45 min
- Hands-on
- 40 min
Ingredients
- 600 g1.3 lb pork backbone (espinazo), in pieces
- 800 g1.75 lb bone-in chicken pieces, thighs and legs
- 3 l12 1/2 cups water
- 1/2 white onion
- 3 cloves garlic
- 1 tbsp coarse salt, plus more to taste
- 6 ears of fresh corn (elotes), kernels cut from 4; the other 2 cut into 4 cm (1 1/2 in) rounds
- 5 guajillo chiles, stemmed and seeded
- 1 to 2 chiles de árbol, optional, for heat
- 4 Mexican squash (calabacitas) or small zucchini, diced
- 200 g7 oz green beans (ejotes), in 2 cm (3/4 in) pieces
- 2 sprigs epazote
- to serve: lime wedges, chopped white onion, tostadas
Method
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1. Put the backbone in a large pot with the water, onion, garlic and salt. Bring to a boil, skim, and simmer for 20 minutes.
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2. Add the chicken and simmer for 25 minutes more, skimming now and then.
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3. Meanwhile, toast the guajillos and chiles de árbol on a dry pan for a few seconds a side, just until they smell toasty and soften; do not let them burn. Soak them in hot water for 10 to 15 minutes.
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4. Add the corn kernels and corn rounds to the pot and simmer until tender: 10 minutes for sweet corn, 25 to 30 minutes for starchy Mexican field corn.
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5. Drain the chiles and blend them with a cup of the broth until completely smooth. Pour the sauce into the pot through a sieve, pressing on the solids.
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6. Add the calabacitas, green beans and epazote and simmer for 10 to 15 minutes, until the vegetables are tender and the broth is brick red.
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7. Taste and season with salt. Serve in deep bowls with a piece of meat, a corn round and plenty of broth, with lime, onion and tostadas alongside.
Notes
- Elopozole is related to pozole but is a different soup: tender fresh corn (elote) takes the place of the nixtamalized cacahuazintle hominy that defines pozole.
- Field corn (maíz) gives the authentic chewy, starchy kernels and slightly thickens the broth; supermarket sweet corn works but makes a sweeter, thinner soup and needs only a short simmer.
- Meat: chicken, pork backbone or both, as you like; cooks in Tixtla offer either.
- Herbs: epazote is usual in Tixtla; a Chilapa recipe recorded by the INPI uses two bunches of a local anise herb instead. Without epazote the soup is milder but still good.
- In Puebla an elopozole is made with chicken, pork shoulder, calabacitas, guajillo and epazote but no green beans.
- The broth and meat can be cooked a day ahead; add the corn and vegetables when you reheat.
Adapted from Elopozole rojo de Chilapa (Gabriela Salazar Barrera, INPI recipe collection), via N+ and Puebla Style Corn Soup – Elopozole, My Slice of Mexico.
At the festivals
Served at 1 festival in Mexico.
Earlier editions
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May 07, 2017 – May 14, 2017
🇲🇽 Chilpancingo, Mexico
12º Festival Nacional del Pozole y el Mezcal