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Hominy, that tough tasteless white, as if just returning from a vegetable vampire party, stuff that hangs out with grit.  Why is this the key ingredient in posole?

Hominy, which is just treated corn, only makes sense after knowing that the treatment was used long ago to prevent corn from sprouting, thus extending the storage life.  Now stuck with a bunch of treated stored corn that wouldn’t go away on its own, the people who invented the treatment also had to invent something to use it for.  Posole was the answer.

Posole

Ingredients
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1 tablespoon dried parsley
1 tablespoon dried basil
2 tablespoons cumin, or to taste
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 – 15 ounce cans chicken broth
1 – 15 ounce can of water
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
1 – 29 ounce can hominy, drained and rinsed
about 3/4 pound cooked pork, shredded or cut in small pieces
1 – medium or large onion, large chop
4 cloves chopped garlic
optionally – any of your favorite peppers (dried, fresh or canned) to add a bit of spice, and/or color

Garnishes (suggestions)
finely sliced onion
cilantro
broken tortilla chips
tortillas for slopping
jalapeno or other pepper
ground cayenne
green onions
thinly sliced radish
sour cream
thinly sliced avocado

Place the chicken broth, water, onion, parsley, basil, oregano, pepper, olive oil and pork in large pot.  Simmer about 30 minutes until the onions are soft.  Add the garlic and hominy to the pot.  Simmer another 15 minutes, or until the hominy is softened to your taste.  Stir in the cumin and remove from the heat.

Serve on the side any of several garnishes; thinly sliced onions, radishes, cilantro, tortilla chips, sour cream, avocado or whatever.  After the soup is in the bowl, the dinner crew can pick and choose the garnishes they prefer to place on soup.  Pictured below are cilantro, sliced onion and broken tortilla chips “floating” on top of the soup.  The chips add a nice crunch to the soup.  Don’t let them soak in the soup.  Keep them crisp.

The secret to Posole is not in the soup.  It’s the garnishes added  to the bowl that makes this soup special.  Pick up a bit of different garnish with each spoonful of soup.  This allows you free rein to create a different taste/texture every time the spoon raises to the mouth.

Tags: cooking, corn, exotic, food, hominy, mexican, posole, recipe, recipes, soup

This entry was posted on 11/19/2011 at 11:02 and is filed under Recipes, Recipes, food, cooking and related items. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.