Chacales are roasted, dried and cracked corn typically cooked in soups. Also called chichales or chuales, it makes a great meatless soup for Lent. You’ll need to mail order chacales, but I’ll give you some easier options below.

New Mexico has lots of recipes for this type of corn, but in northern Mexico you will typically see it served as a soup during Lent. I’ve eaten it in Mexico, and recreated the soup below.

It’s really simple, and really good! The stewed corn stays chewy and almost meaty — it definitely tricks your mouth into thinking you’re eating meat — and the accompaniments are perfect for late winter or early spring.

Obtaining Chacales

Making chacales is time consuming, so most people buy it. If you happen to live around Native Americans, many groups make something like this, and you might be able to buy from them. New Mexico calls chacales chicos, and I’ve seen them in regular supermarkets there, as well as in Arizona.

But you can easily buy chacales online, as well as chicos, which are close enough.

You want starchy corn here, so don’t use fresh or frozen sweet corn. You could get away with pozole corn, but that has been nixtamalized, and chacales generally aren’t, so it would be different, but still good. And if you happen to have access to regular starchy corn, have at it!

If you want to make your own chacales, it’s not terribly difficult: You roast, steam or smoke ears of corn, in the husks, until they are nicely cooked, strip the husks off and then dry the ears in the sun or a dehydrator. Once completely dry, which takes days or weeks depending on your climate, you strip the kernels off.

This process typically cracks a lot of the kernels, which is good, because that opens the starch up in them to thicken soups or stews. Once made, chacales keep for years if kept dry.

Making Chacales Soup

Chacales as a Lenten soup has a loose structure, but as with many Mexican recipes, there is plenty of room for your own sazon, your own flair.

It’s almost always a mix of the corn, onions and garlic, something red — chiles or tomatoes — cilantro and cheese. I’ve seen both roasted, peeled, seeded and chopped green chiles as well as chiles pasados, which are the same green chiles that are then dried and rehydrated.

The red thing is usually tomatoes of some sort, usually hand crushed whole and peeled, or, alternatively, I’ve seen what is essentially a red enchilada sauce poured into the chacales soup at the end, which gives it a vivid red color.

Either way, the main chore in cooking chacales is getting the corn tender enough to eat. You can soak it overnight or just boil it for an hour or so before you start the rest of the soup. You want the kernels to be chewy, but pleasantly so.

Beyond that, it’s simple: Fry some onions and garlic in lard (which is acceptable during Lent), or oil, add to the corn, crush some tomatoes into it, or add the salsa, or both, garnish with cilantro and add shredded melty cheese in at the end.

Serving and Storing

The soup keeps a week in the fridge, and it freezes well. You could also pressure can it, using standard guidelines for soups.

In Mexico, you usually see chacales served with corn or flour tortillas. Bread is another good option. I’ve served leftover soup with freshly made rice, too.

Oh, and you absolutely can add meat to your soup if you want.

If you’re looking for other recipes that use chicos or chacales, try my green chile stew, or my New Mexican turkey leg stew.

If you liked this recipe, please leave a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ rating and a comment below; I’d love to hear how everything went. If you’re on Instagram, share a picture and tag me at huntgathercook.