Festival del Mole Poblano

The Festival del Mole Poblano celebrates in October the world's most complex sauce in the city where it was born: Puebla. Over 3 days in the historic center, a UNESCO World Heritage site, more than 40 traditional home cooks and restaurants compete with their versions of mole negro, mole rojo, pipián and mole de caderas. Workshops, tastings, wine and mezcal pairings, and the presentation of the Trophy for Best Mole of Puebla are the main events.

History

According to tradition, mole poblano was created in the 17th century by the nuns of the Convento de Santa Rosa in Puebla as a welcome dish for Viceroy Tomás Antonio de la Cerda. Mole (from Nahuatl 'molli': sauce) is actually a pre-Hispanic preparation of chiles and seeds that the nuns enriched with European ingredients. The festival was born in 2003 to rescue family mole recipes that were disappearing.