Mole verde (MOH-leh VEHR-deh) is chicken served in a thick, pale green sauce made from 1 cup of toasted pumpkin seeds, just over a pound of tomatillos, green chiles and a big handful of fresh herbs. If you only know mole as the dark, chocolate-tinged sauce from Puebla, this is its fresh, quick relative: no dried chiles, no chocolate, and 75 minutes start to finish for 6 people. The catch is colour. Boil the herbs and the sauce turns khaki brown; boil the pepitas hard and it splits into a grainy, oily mess. The fix is two separate blends, one cooked and one added raw at the very end, and the rest of this page is about getting that right with what a US or UK supermarket sells.
What is mole verde?
How do you make mole verde with chicken? Poach 3¼ lb (1.5 kg) of bone-in chicken for 35 minutes and keep the broth. Blend 1 cup (150 g) of toasted pepitas with 1 lb 2 oz (500 g) of simmered tomatillos, serranos, onion, garlic and broth; fry the purée for 8 minutes, then simmer 10 more with broth over low heat. Stir in the chicken and a purée of raw herbs and warm for 5 minutes without boiling. Ready in 75 minutes for 6 servings.
In Mexican cooking, a mole is a sauce thickened with ground ingredients, and a pipián is one thickened mainly with seeds, usually pumpkin seeds. In Puebla and the State of Mexico, this green pumpkin seed sauce is called pipián verde, and plenty of home cooks there call it mole verde too. For practical purposes they are the same dish, and that central Mexican version is the one on this page.
Oaxacan mole verde is different. It has no pumpkin seeds. It is thickened with corn masa and flavoured with hoja santa, epazote and parsley, and usually made with pork, white beans, green beans and chayote. There is a note on adapting the recipe that way further down.
It isn’t chicken in salsa verde either. Chicken in salsa verde is braised in a thinner, sharper sauce of tomatillos, chile, onion and cilantro with no seeds. Mole verde is thicker, almost creamy from the pepitas, and much more herbal. If you have made Guerrero-style pozole verde, the flavour will be familiar, since its broth gets a very similar pepita sauce. And compared with mole poblano or Oaxacan mole negro, which take hours and a long shopping list, mole verde is the everyday one.
Ingredients and where to find them in the US and UK
| Ingredient | Metric | US | What it does, and swaps |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bone-in chicken thighs and drumsticks, skinless | 1.5 kg | 3¼ lb | Stays juicy and makes the broth for the sauce |
| Raw hulled pepitas, unsalted | 150 g | 1 cup | Body and creaminess; 100 g (⅔ cup) for a lighter sauce |
| Tomatillos | 500 g | 1 lb 2 oz | Tartness; canned work too |
| Serrano chiles | 3 | 3 | Medium heat; 2 jalapeños for mild |
| Cilantro, parsley, romaine | 40 g, 20 g, 60 g | 1 bunch, ½ bunch, 2 leaves | The green colour; spinach can replace the lettuce |
| Epazote | 10 g | 2 sprigs | The distinctive herbal flavour |
| Hoja santa | 1 leaf | 1 leaf | Optional, anise-like |
Tomatillos look like small green tomatoes in a papery husk. They are tart and are not unripe tomatoes, which won’t work here. In the US they are in the produce section of most large supermarkets. In the UK they are hard to find fresh; buy canned whole tomatillos from a Mexican grocery specialist online. A 28 oz (794 g) can drains to roughly 550 g (1 lb 3 oz) of fruit, enough for this recipe. Canned ones are already cooked, so drain them and go straight to the blender.
Pepitas are hulled green pumpkin seeds. US stores sell them as pepitas in the nut or bulk aisle; UK supermarkets sell them as pumpkin seeds with the baking ingredients or snacks. Buy raw and unsalted, not roasted and salted.
Chiles. Serranos are sold in US supermarkets with a Latin produce section. In the UK, use fresh green jalapeños if you can find them, or ordinary green chillies, which vary a lot in heat, so add them one at a time and taste.
Epazote and hoja santa, and what to do without them
- Epazote has a strong, resinous taste unlike any common herb. US Latin markets carry it fresh; in the UK it is usually sold dried online. Dried epazote adds flavour but no colour, so crumble 1 tsp into the pepita blend rather than the herb blend. Without any, add more cilantro: the sauce is still good, just flatter.
- Hoja santa is a large, anise-scented leaf. It is optional in this version and has no real substitute. I would rather leave it out than fake it with another herb.
Equipment. A 5-quart (5 litre) pot for the chicken, a skillet, a blender and a heavy 4 to 5 quart pot for the sauce, which holds heat evenly and stops the seeds catching. If your blender leaves the sauce gritty, push it through a fine sieve before frying.
How to keep mole verde green and smooth
The full steps are in the recipe card. The timing works like this: the chicken spends about 45 minutes on the stove, and the whole pepita sauce fits inside that window. Toast the seeds while the water comes to a boil, then simmer the tomatillos, blend and fry while the chicken poaches, ladling broth straight from its pot. The herbs are blended last, once the chicken is out.
- Pepitas. They puff, start popping in the pan and take on the faintest golden tint after 4 to 5 minutes. Dark brown seeds make the sauce bitter and dull its colour; toast a new batch.
- Tomatillos. They turn from bright green to olive and soften without splitting after 8 to 10 minutes. Burst tomatillos leak water and make the sauce sharper. Don’t char them under the broiler for this dish either; blackened skins darken the sauce.
- Frying the base. 8 minutes of stirring until it thickens, spits less and goes a shade darker. This cooks out the raw taste.
- Simmering with broth. Small bubbles rising slowly for 10 minutes, never a rolling boil.
- Done. Pale green, smooth and glossy, thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Run a finger through it on the spoon and the line should hold.
Why it turns brown. Cilantro, parsley and lettuce lose their green with long cooking, which is why they are blended raw and only spend 5 minutes on the heat, below a boil.
Why it splits. Pumpkin seeds are rich in oil. A hard boil separates that oil and the sauce looks grainy with green oil on top. If it happens, take it off the heat, blend the sauce with a splash of hot broth until smooth again, and sieve it if needed.
Making it ahead, and for a crowd
- The day before. Poach the chicken and refrigerate the meat and broth separately. You can also cook the pepita base with its broth, without the herbs.
- On the day. Warm the base over low heat, blend the herbs and finish with the chicken, about 15 minutes.
- For 12. Double everything and blend in batches, because an overfull blender won’t grind the seeds smooth. Use an 8-quart (8 litre) pot and allow about 5 extra minutes to fry the base.
Mistakes and fixes
- Brown or dull sauce. Boiled herbs or over-toasted seeds. Blend a handful of raw cilantro with a little broth, stir it in at the end and don’t boil again.
- Grainy, with oil on top. It boiled hard. Re-blend with hot broth.
- Sandy texture. The seeds weren’t fully ground. Blend longer or sieve before frying.
- Bitter. Burnt pepitas. There’s no fix; toast a fresh batch.
- Too thick the next day. The seeds keep thickening as it sits. Add broth until it coats a spoon.
- Tastes raw. The base wasn’t fried. Don’t skip those 8 minutes.
Allergens. Gluten-free and dairy-free. Pumpkin seeds are a seed allergen; if you add sesame, as some cooks do, that is a major allergen too.
Variations
- Milder, for kids. 1 serrano with the seeds and veins removed, and chopped chile on the table.
- With vegetables. Green beans, zucchini (UK courgette) or chayote in ¾ in (2 cm) pieces simmer in the sauce for 8 to 10 minutes before the herbs go in.
- Nuttier and thicker. Swap 50 g (⅓ cup) of the pepitas for toasted sesame seeds.
- Oaxacan style. Skip the pepitas. For every 1.5 litres (6⅓ cups) of broth, whisk 6 tbsp (about 50 g) of masa harina into 250 ml (1 cup) of water, stir it in and simmer for 10 minutes until it is like thin cream. Use parsley, epazote and hoja santa, which is essential here, and serve with cooked white beans. Pork is the usual meat.
- Vegetarian. Vegetable stock, with potatoes, green beans, zucchini and chayote, or cooked white beans, in place of the chicken.
- Cheaper. After the chicken, the pepitas are the expensive part, especially in the UK. With 100 g (⅔ cup) the sauce is lighter but still a mole.
Serving, storing and reheating
Serving. One or two pieces of chicken per plate, well covered in sauce, with rice and homemade corn tortillas. Mexican red rice is a good match, and plain white rice works too. A plate without rice or tortillas comes to about 428 kcal and 43 g of protein.
Fridge. Into a covered container within 2 hours of cooking, then 3 to 4 days at 40°F (4°C) or below. The colour drifts towards olive in the fridge; the flavour doesn’t change.
Freezer. Up to 3 months, in portions with the sauce covering the chicken. Thawed sauce can look grainy; stirring in a little broth as it reheats, or blending just the sauce, brings it back.
Reheating. In a pot over low heat, covered and stirred, with a splash of broth or water since it will have thickened, until steaming and 165°F (74°C). High heat splits it. To bring back the green, blend a few sprigs of cilantro with broth and stir them in at the end.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between mole verde and pipián verde? In central Mexico they are essentially the same green sauce thickened with pumpkin seeds; pipián is the name for seed-thickened moles. Oaxacan mole verde is the exception, thickened with masa and without pepitas.
Can I use roasted, salted pepitas? They make a darker sauce and the salt is hard to control. If they are all you have, skip the toasting, cut the salt in the sauce and taste before adding more.
Is mole verde spicy? With 3 serranos it is medium, 2 out of 5. Two jalapeños with the seeds removed make it mild.
Why is my mole verde sour? Tomatillos are tart, especially canned or burst ones. Frying the base for the full 8 minutes mellows it; if it is still sharp, blend a little more pepita with broth and stir it in.
I learned the hard way that mole verde forgives almost everything except the boil. The first time, I blended the herbs in with the seeds and let the pot simmer for half an hour, and it came out the colour of lentil soup. It tasted fine, but it wasn’t green. Two blends and one extra blender jar to wash is a small price. Josnaisis.