How do you soften pumpkin seeds for Chicken Mole?

Question

I made chicken mole for the first time following this recipe. It was delicious, and I'm planning to make it again. However, the hulled pumpkin seeds (pepitas) didn't fully break down. So the sauce was unexpectedly crunchy.

I actually slightly altered the steps of that recipe and actually boiled them with the guajilo+ancho peppers in that step. It didn't seem to help. Maybe I should have run the blender a little longer, past the point where the contents were homogeneous.

So anyway, how do you make chicken mole without the pumpkin seeds giving it some crunch? Or is the dish supposed to be a little crunchy?

Answer 1

You should have pureed the sauce longer. A proper pipián or mole is ground until homogeneous and nothing is larger than a grain of sand. It's not a salsa.

Example:

The ingredients are ground together into a powder or a paste that creates a seamless layering of complex flavors.

Assuming that you did actually toast the pepitas properly (until they "pop"), the soak in hot water would not have hurt the texture.