Mole, Oaxaca’s national dish, is more than sustenance; it’s a celebration, a technique, heritage. Its magic lies in the building of flavor from a copious list of ingredients.

I found mole magic at Patria Cocina in Grant Park. Delivered as a shareable dish on three crisp, house-made tostadas, Patria’s mole can be an appetizer or an entree.

The sauce — mixed with tender chicken — was topped with pickled red onion, cotija cheese and sliced avocado. Dark as night and with a swirl of aromas, the mole engaged all my senses. It tasted of decades of recipes handed down. I could envision the grinding of rehydrated chiles to add thickness, bitterness and fruity notes; the toasting of nuts and seeds; and the hours of stirring. The sauce was velvety, weighty and toed the line between sweet and savory, with a slow heat that built.

A small amount of chocolate — a pre-Columbian touchstone — never dominated this soulful sauce, in which the whole was greater than the sum of its parts.

Patria Cocina. 1039 Grant St., Atlanta. 404-622-3501, patriacocinaatl.com

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