Courtesy Holy Mole
Tuna ceviche and house made tortilla crisps from Holy Mole
Mission Taco Joint owners Adam and Jason Tilford just announced the launch of Holy Mole, a ghost kitchen concept. The menu is inspired by the team’s Milagro Modern Mexican restaurant, which shuttered in Webster Groves in 2018.
As the name suggests, mole—a style of Mexican sauce that's characterized by typically dense texture and deep, layered flavors—is at the heart of the menu. Holy Mole offers a range of proteins teamed with three different moles. Each is prepared with a variety of ingredients that could include vegetables, fruits, dried chiles, nuts, seeds, sweeteners, and spices. In spite of the use of dried chiles, moles are not typically noted for being spicy.
Courtesy Holy Mole
An assortment of mole-based dishes from Holy Mole
Patrons can choose from such starters as roasted poblano salsa—a Milagro classic—served with house-made chips. Other menu items that erstwhile fans of Milagro will welcome include the house salad, mole poblano with roasted chicken, mole negro with beef short ribs, and plantain mole with roasted salmon. The mole entrées are paired with cilantro rice and smashed black beans. (Visit Holy Mole’s website for the entire menu and ordering information.) Beer and wine can also be ordered, with proof of I.D. required upon delivery.
The brothers launched their first ghost-kitchen concept, Off the Wall Burgers, out of the Kirkwood Mission Taco in late November. (Off the Wall Burgers is on temporary hiatus as indoor dining and Holy Mole ramp up.)
Jason Tilford says the new Milagro-inspired idea came about partially as a response to calls from customers on social media yearning for Milagro’s dishes to make a comeback.
“Someone posed the question on Facebook asking friends to share the favorite dish that they’ve ever had,” Tilford said in a release. “Among responses from travels around the world were two mentions of former Milagro dishes—the tuna ceviche and the salmon with plantain mole. I kind of got called out to bring it back. In all seriousness, we love and miss the menu at Milagro, so it feels exciting and nostalgic to reintroduce the favorite dishes in this new format.”
A recent dinner that the Tilfords hosted for Mission Taco managers featured several mole dishes and confirmed the conviction behind the concept. “It reminded me how much I love the sauce and how modern Mexican cuisine inspires me as a chef,” Tilford says. “It takes so much care and time to make, with over 20 ingredients cooked slowly together. It’s nuanced and comforting—perfect for winter.”
Holy Mole delivers from 2–5 p.m. on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays; orders must be placed online before midnight the night before. Deliveries are available within a five-mile radius of Mission Taco Joint’s central kitchen in Webster Groves, and each order arrives with instructions for assembly and reheating. If you're located beyond that delivery range, don’t despair; the Holy Mole team might be able to figure out a solution, depending on the location, which could range from arranging a delivery fee to holding the order for pickup. Email holymole@milagromodernmexican.com for details.
Tilford is also welcoming input from customers on other dishes they'd like to see revived or added to the menu. The intention is to keep the menu small initially for inventory management, but that it can expand over time. "If people start saying, 'Hey, I gotta have such and such,' we'll look into making that," Tilford said.
"I'm a chef and chefs like to do that kind of stuff," he added. "But it's been different with the pandemic, trying to figure out ways to get food to people when they can't eat out or don't want to eat out. That's where ghost kitchens come in."
