Last night Chrissy and I made the Puerco Pibil (slow roasted pork) from Once Upon a Time in Mexico using Robert Rodriguez's 10-minute cooking school recipe. Damn was it tasty! Tender, a bit spicy, and just all around delicious.
All of the ingredients were readily available at Safeway except for the Annatto (Achiote) seeds. Fortunately, Chrissy was able to find them at a Mexican grocery store. We also weren't able to find banana leaves, but based on Rodriguez's comments, they're mostly for appearances anyway.
I had to purchase a coffee/spice grinder, a blender, and a knife set to make the meal, but I've been cooking more and more recently so I expect they'll be getting plenty of use.
The dish itself was dead simple to make. Grind up the spices, blend with OJ, vinegar, garlic, salt, and habanero peppers. Cut up 5 lbs of pork butt and put it in a large ziploc bag with the marinade. Shake it around a bit, then put it in a pan and slow roast for 4 hours. There really isn't any way to mess it up. I'll definitely be making it again!
My one bit of advice is to use latex gloves when you work with the habanero peppers. I was cleaning the seeds and vein out of the habanero peppers, and I inadvertently ended up touching the area above my upper lip. Needless to say there was a bit of burning for a while (though rubbing it with a milk-soaked paper towel helped). Next time gloves will be used.
As you can see from the lack of knife being used in the photo, our pork turned out extremely tender. We served it over couscous and yes, it tasted as good as it looks. I posted a few additional photos on flickr.
Even if you're not much of a cook, I highly recommend you try making this meal. You won't regret it.
At the end of the cooking school video Rodriguez suggests learning to cook a few dishes really, really well and then creating yourself a "house menu". Then whenever someone comes over, they can pick anything off the menu and you'll have a great dinner. Consider a menu for JMarr to already be underway and despite the risk to my own life you can rest assured that Puerco Pibil will be on the menu.
I had to purchase a coffee/spice grinder, a blender, and a knife set to make the meal, but I've been cooking more and more recently so I expect they'll be getting plenty of use.
The dish itself was dead simple to make. Grind up the spices, blend with OJ, vinegar, garlic, salt, and habanero peppers. Cut up 5 lbs of pork butt and put it in a large ziploc bag with the marinade. Shake it around a bit, then put it in a pan and slow roast for 4 hours. There really isn't any way to mess it up. I'll definitely be making it again!
As you can see from the lack of knife being used in the photo, our pork turned out extremely tender. We served it over couscous and yes, it tasted as good as it looks. I posted a few additional photos on flickr.
Even if you're not much of a cook, I highly recommend you try making this meal. You won't regret it.
At the end of the cooking school video Rodriguez suggests learning to cook a few dishes really, really well and then creating yourself a "house menu". Then whenever someone comes over, they can pick anything off the menu and you'll have a great dinner. Consider a menu for JMarr to already be underway and despite the risk to my own life you can rest assured that Puerco Pibil will be on the menu.
