Chef Lupita
Chanfaina Conventual Poblana
Puebla's convent chanfaina, built from lamb heart, liver, and kidney in a chile ancho broth with almonds, raisins, olives, capers, and the discipline of the cloister kitchen.
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Asado de Boda Potosino
Created by
San Luis Potosi's wedding asado, pork browned in manteca de cerdo and finished in a chile ancho sauce perfumed with orange, canela, clove, and chocolate.
Main Dishes
Mexican
Special Occasion
Celebration
Make Ahead
45 min
Active Time
2 hr 15 min cook•3 hr total
Yield8 servings
San Luis Potosi, especially the Altiplano and the old mining towns around the center of the state, owns this version of asado de boda. This is wedding food, baptism food, the pot that sits in the back of a family kitchen while the tables are being set and the tortillas are wrapped in cloth. It is pork, not beef. It is chile ancho, not a random red sauce. Cada estado, su propia cocina.
The chile ancho gives the body and the dark red color. The orange, canela, clove, and a small square of Mexican table chocolate tell you this plate passed through convent hands and colonial kitchens before it became pueblo food. That Old World pantry is not decoration. It is the architecture of the sauce. Sweetness, bitterness, fat, chile, spice. If one is missing, the sauce loses its spine.
I learned a potosino version from a senora near Armadillo de los Infante who fried the pork first in manteca de cerdo until the edges browned hard, then poured in the strained chile paste and let it darken slowly. She did not rush. She did not apologize for the lard. La manteca es el sabor. This dish is better the next day, when the chile and the pork have stopped arguing and started behaving like family.
Serve it in a clay cazuela with rice, beans, and warm corn tortillas. No lettuce. No sour cream. No shredded yellow cheese. This is asado de boda, and the wedding is in San Luis Potosi.
Asado de boda is most strongly associated with the north-central states of Zacatecas and San Luis Potosi, where it became a celebratory pork dish tied to weddings and large family gatherings during the colonial and post-independence periods. Its chile ancho base reflects central Mexican dried-chile cookery, while cinnamon, clove, chocolate, almonds, and citrus belong to the conventual pantry shaped by Spanish Catholic institutions and the abstinence calendar that trained cloister kitchens to engineer richness from preserved ingredients. Unlike mole poblano, asado de boda is not a chocolate sauce; the chocolate is one bitter-sweet note inside a fried chile and pork stew.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
pork shoulder
Quantity
3 pounds
cut into 1 1/2-inch chunks
kosher salt
Quantity
2 teaspoons, plus more to taste
freshly ground black pepper
Quantity
1/2 teaspoon
manteca de cerdo
Quantity
1/2 cup
dried chile ancho
Quantity
10
stemmed and seeded
dried chile guajillo
Quantity
2
stemmed and seeded
hot water
Quantity
3 cups
for soaking the chiles
garlic cloves
Quantity
4
unpeeled
white onion
Quantity
1 medium
quartered
Roma tomatoes
Quantity
2
halved
bolillo or day-old white bread
Quantity
1 bolillo or 2 thick slices
blanched almonds
Quantity
1/4 cup
sesame seeds
Quantity
1 tablespoon, plus more for serving
Mexican cinnamon stick
Quantity
1
whole cloves
Quantity
3
whole black peppercorns
Quantity
4
dried Mexican oregano
Quantity
1/2 teaspoon
dried thyme
Quantity
1/4 teaspoon
bay leaf
Quantity
1
orange peel
Quantity
1 strip
white pith removed
fresh orange juice
Quantity
1/2 cup
Mexican table chocolate
Quantity
1 ounce
chopped
piloncillo or dark brown sugar (optional)
Quantity
1 tablespoon
only if the orange is sharp
pork broth or water
Quantity
2 cups, plus more as needed
Mexican red rice (optional)
Quantity
for serving
frijoles de la olla (optional)
Quantity
for serving
warm corn tortillas (optional)
Quantity
for serving
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| pork shouldercut into 1 1/2-inch chunks | 3 pounds |
| kosher salt | 2 teaspoons, plus more to taste |
| freshly ground black pepper | 1/2 teaspoon |
| manteca de cerdo | 1/2 cup |
| dried chile anchostemmed and seeded | 10 |
| dried chile guajillostemmed and seeded | 2 |
| hot waterfor soaking the chiles | 3 cups |
| garlic clovesunpeeled | 4 |
| white onionquartered | 1 medium |
| Roma tomatoeshalved | 2 |
| bolillo or day-old white bread | 1 bolillo or 2 thick slices |
| blanched almonds | 1/4 cup |
| sesame seeds | 1 tablespoon, plus more for serving |
| Mexican cinnamon stick | 1 |
| whole cloves | 3 |
| whole black peppercorns | 4 |
| dried Mexican oregano | 1/2 teaspoon |
| dried thyme | 1/4 teaspoon |
| bay leaf | 1 |
| orange peelwhite pith removed | 1 strip |
| fresh orange juice | 1/2 cup |
| Mexican table chocolatechopped | 1 ounce |
| piloncillo or dark brown sugar (optional)only if the orange is sharp | 1 tablespoon |
| pork broth or water | 2 cups, plus more as needed |
| Mexican red rice (optional) | for serving |
| frijoles de la olla (optional) | for serving |
| warm corn tortillas (optional) | for serving |
Equipment Needed
- •Cast iron comal or heavy skillet for toasting chiles
- •Wide 6-quart clay cazuela or heavy Dutch oven
- •High-powered blender
- •Fine-mesh strainer
- •Wooden spoon for scraping and stirring the sauce
Instructions
- 1
Season the pork
Pat the pork dry and season it with the salt and black pepper. Let it sit while you prepare the chiles. Dry meat browns. Wet meat boils. That difference matters in asado de boda because the fried pork gives the sauce its backbone.
- 2
Toast the chiles
Heat a dry comal over medium. Toast the chile ancho one or two at a time, about 20 to 30 seconds per side, just until the skins puff and the smell turns deep and raisiny. Toast the guajillo the same way, watching closely because it is thinner. Do not blacken them. Burned chile will make the whole cazuela bitter.
Chile ancho should smell like dried fruit and warm tobacco after toasting. If it smells scorched, throw it out. No me vengas con atajos. - 3
Soak the chiles
Place the toasted chiles in a bowl and cover with hot water, not boiling water. Let them soften for 20 minutes. Boiling water roughs up the skin and can pull bitterness into the sauce. Hot water softens the flesh cleanly. Reserve 1 cup of the soaking liquid, then drain the chiles.
- 4
Toast the base
On the same comal, roast the unpeeled garlic, onion, and tomatoes until they are spotted and softened. Peel the garlic. Tear the bolillo into pieces and toast it lightly. Toast the almonds, sesame seeds, cinnamon stick, cloves, and peppercorns just until fragrant. Keep everything moving. The spices should wake up, not burn.
- 5
Blend the sauce
Blend the soaked chiles with the roasted garlic, onion, tomatoes, toasted bread, almonds, sesame, cinnamon, cloves, peppercorns, oregano, thyme, orange peel, orange juice, chocolate, and 1 cup pork broth. Blend until completely smooth. Work in batches if your blender struggles. Strain through a fine-mesh sieve into a bowl, pressing hard on the solids. A wedding sauce should be smooth enough to coat the pork, not gritty.
- 6
Brown the pork
Melt the manteca de cerdo in a wide heavy pot or clay cazuela over medium-high heat. Add the pork in batches and brown it on all sides, 8 to 10 minutes per batch. Do not crowd the pot. The meat should take on dark golden edges and leave browned bits in the fat. Those bits are flavor. La manteca es el sabor.
- 7
Fry the sauce
Lower the heat to medium. Return all the pork to the pot and pour the strained chile sauce over it. It will sputter. Stir well, scraping the browned bits from the bottom. Cook uncovered for 8 to 10 minutes, stirring often, until the sauce darkens and the fat starts to separate at the edges. This frying is what makes asado taste like asado, not boiled chile puree.
- 8
Simmer the asado
Add the bay leaf and enough pork broth or water to barely cover the meat. Bring to a gentle simmer, then cover partially and cook for 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes, stirring every 15 minutes so the sauce does not catch. The pork is ready when a piece yields easily to a spoon and the sauce clings thickly to the meat.
- 9
Balance the sauce
Taste for salt. If the orange was sharp and the chile tastes too bitter, add the piloncillo and simmer 5 minutes more. Do not make it candy-sweet. Asado de boda should be savory first, with sweetness from the orange, spice, and chocolate sitting behind the chile ancho.
- 10
Serve the cazuela
Let the asado rest 15 minutes before serving. Spoon it into a clay cazuela and scatter a little toasted sesame over the top. Serve with Mexican red rice, frijoles de la olla, and warm corn tortillas. This is food for a table, not a plated performance. Saber cocinar es saber vivir.
Chef Tips
- •Buy chile ancho that is flexible, dark, and smells sweet, not dusty. If the chile cracks like old paper, it has been sitting too long. Ask the women at the market. Preguntale a las senoras del mercado.
- •Do not replace the manteca de cerdo with vegetable oil and expect the same dish. Oil can brown meat. Lard carries the pork flavor into the sauce. A substitution is a compromise, not an upgrade.
- •The chocolate is not the main flavor. Use one small square of Mexican table chocolate, the kind with sugar and cinnamon. Too much and you push the dish toward mole poblano. That is Puebla's conversation, not San Luis Potosi's.
- •If you want the convent register stronger for a feast table, add 2 tablespoons raisins with the almonds and blend them into the sauce. The sweetness should stay disciplined. This is a wedding stew, not dessert.
- •Asado de boda tastes better after a night in the refrigerator. The sauce thickens, the pork absorbs the chile, and the orange settles down.
Advance Preparation
- •The chile sauce can be made 2 days ahead and refrigerated. Fry it with the browned pork on the day you cook the asado.
- •The finished asado can be made 1 day ahead. Reheat gently over low heat with a splash of pork broth or water, stirring often so the sauce does not scorch.
- •For a wedding or large celebration, double the recipe and cook in two wide pots instead of one crowded pot. Crowding the pork prevents browning, and browning is part of the recipe.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 520g)
Calories
850 calories
Total Fat
47 g
Saturated Fat
17 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
25 g
Cholesterol
125 mg
Sodium
980 mg
Total Carbohydrates
72 g
Dietary Fiber
12 g
Sugars
9 g
Protein
43 g
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