Carnitas

The stuff carnivorous dream are made of.

If you have a pulse, you know what carnitas are and that they are delicious. This is all that this post requires of you, so fear not the history lesson. However, if you, like me, like a little insight with your tacos, read on.

The birthplace of carnitas is usually credited to the state of Michoacán in Mexico, but there is at least some debate about that, with other origin stories pointing to Mexico (the state), Hidalgo, Jalisco, or Querataro. Certainly the styles of the carnitas from these areas vary, with the base recipe supplemented by different spices, as well as different liquid additions: orange juice, beer, Coca-Cola, and even milk.

What they all have in common is the method of cooking the pork. If you have read my post on duck confit, it will strike you as very familiar. Carnitas consist of pig meat, cooked in its own fat.

Traditionally, this happens in a cazo de cobre - or large copper pot - filled with lard. Here, the pork is cooked slowly, at low temperatures, to tenderize tough but flavorful bits of the hog such as legs and shoulders. The lard is often kept in the cauldron to be used again and again.

I have two things to tell you about this method of cooking. One is sciency, and the other is historical.

(Note that I will be referring to “meat”, “chunks of meat”, “pig meat”, “pork” and “meat fibers” quite a bit. If you are either grossed out or titillated by this, stop distracting the class and grow up. I am feeling carnivorous and not in the mood for your nonsense.)

First, history. Cooking in fat, whether frying or slow-cooking, is a method that was imported to Mexico by the Europeans. There is a legend that when Cortez defeated the Aztecs, he celebrated by making carnitas. In point of fact, a monk documenting the happenings referred to swine being brought to the table, but anything beyond that is pure fiction. Carnitas are a celebratory tradition in many parts of Mexico, and I don’t think there’s any reason to dishonor them by association with that particular dude.

Next, science. Collagen is the stuff in meat that makes it tough. There is very little collagen in tenderloin, and quite a bit in beef shank, duck legs, and pork shoulder. When you heat collagen at high temperatures, it tends to shorten, squeezing meat fibers and making them release water. If cooked in an oven, on the stovetop or on a grill, this water will evaporate, drying the meat. The shortened collagen fibers, not given enough time to break down, make the meat tough.

However, if you cook that tough cut at a lower temperature - right around 160F - the collagen will begin to break down. Given enough time, it becomes a silky mixture of peptides and proteins known as gelatin. If that meat is cooked in fat, in a pressure cooker, slow cooker, or sous vide, any liquid released stays with the meat, hydrating the gelatin between the meat fibers and giving you a tender, juicy end product.

This is why I love science and you should, too.

Chunk-style pork, after its roasty-toast in the oven.

So let’s break it down (like collagen in a cazo de cobre)…

Carnitas need to be cooked low and slow, in a way that doesn’t allow the escape of their moisture. I have tried virtually all the methods of doing this available to a home cook. 1. Cooking the meat sous vide, sealed in bags containing all the yummy add-ins, then shredding and finishing in the oven for the mandatory brown and crisp edges. 2. Cooking the meat on the stovetop, covered in broth and those same goodies until it all breaks down and the liquids reduce. (This was my least favorite - a little messy, and though very tender and saucey, almost too tender without the crisp edges I wanted.) 3. Cooking on low in a slow cooker. My favorite method, and the one I am sticking with from here on. See below.

One last note on finishing. People in the US seem to want to make carnitas look like pulled pork, but the traditional texture is closer to burnt ends. The carniterias take large chunks of meat, crisped on the outside, and chop them. To get a similar bite at home, take those big chunks of meat out of your slow cooker, transfer to a large roasting pan so they all sit in a single layer, pour the slow cooker juices over the top, and roast until they achieve a nice mahogany brown. Chop roughly, add to your serving dish with any left over juice, and throw a touch of fleur de sel on top. That last part’s not from the carniterias, that’s from me. And you’re welcome.

Savory, citrusy, sweet and spicy.

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Shit You Need

1. Boneless pork shoulder, also called Boston butt (…yeah, I know), 4-5 pounds

2. 1 large onion, halved and cut in thick slices

3. 5 cloves garlic, peeled and left whole

4. 1 orange, quartered

5. 2 bay leaves

6. 1 cinnamon stick

7. 2 Tbs kosher salt

8. 4 Tbs brown sugar

9. 1 1/2 tsp ground ancho chile

10. 1 1/2 tsp ground chipotle chile

11. 2 tsp smoked paprika

12. 2 tsp dried oregano
    

Ready for the slow cook.

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Keep Calm and justeffingcook

1. First things first: take off any string that your pork shoulder came tied with. Slice off the fat cap and reserve it. Break the shoulder down. First, along the planes the different muscle make, then into roughly 4-inch chunks. Along the way, feel free to remove and discard unsightly fat and stringy shit. If you have picky eaters, this will save you either work or headaches.

2. To your slow cooker, add the onions, garlic, and pork. Scatter salt, sugar, chiles, oregano and paprika over the pork. Squeeze each orange quarter over the pork, then toss the peel in after it. Add cinnamon stick and bay leaves. Add the big ‘ol chunk of fat you reserved to the pot.

3. Toss everything together with tongs or with clean hands to distribute the spices evenly.

4. Cook on low for 5 hours. (4-6 is the range. In my cooker, 5 hours is the sweet spot.)

5. Preheat your oven to 425F. When you’ve reached the end of the slow cooker cook, add the chunks of pork to a large roasting pan or a 9x13 inch Pyrex baking dish. Strain the juices remaining in the slow cooker and pour over the pork.

6. Roast in the oven for 30-40 minutes, aiming for mahogany-colored chunks of meat. There should be juice left in the bottom of your pan.

7. When cool enough to handle, roughly chop the pork into taco-appropriate-sized pieces, toss into a serving dish, and pour remaining juices over the top.

8. Serve with homemade corn tortillas, pico de gallo, queso fresco, and whatever fixins’ strike your fancy on the side.

Lowcountry Shrimp and Grits

If you go all out on this - make your own pimiento cheese, blanch and peel those tomatoes, get some top-shelf bacon - it will possibly be one of the best things you’ve eaten in your life.

If you half-ass it, it will still be awesome.

Grits require a brief discussion. At some point in the last ten years, someone figured out that the trendy, upscale polenta served in so many fine dining establishments was actually the same concoction as supposedly-trailer-trash grits. But grits are arguable better because they’re made by grandma (and don’t you never-ever throw shade on Nanna’s cooking).

So now grits are experiencing a renaissance of trendiness, riding the tide of buttermilk biscuits, banana pudding, and…pimiento cheese. Not only do all these Southern dishes deserve our attention, they always have.

I feel a personal connection to these dishes, in part because that’s my ancestry - all my great-great-great grandparents were poor dirt farmers in the Carolinas and Kentucky - and in part because these kinds of dishes inspire connection. Period. We stand on the shoulders of culinary giants in this country, and many of these giants were women in Southern kitchens. Many, if not most, of these women were black. And all of them cooked delicious food with what they had, no matter how meager. Because what wasn’t meager was the love that went into every pot, pan, and batch.

And that makes all the difference.

Shrimp and grits is a Lowcountry specialty, just like pimiento cheese. If you’ve never heard of it, the Lowcountry is the coastal region of South Carolina, just eking across the border into the sea islands of northern Georgia. It is beautiful there, with Spanish moss-draped live oaks and scrubby palms, pristine marshes, and tidal rivers filled with shrimp, oysters, and redfish.

The oxymoronic jumbo shrimp.

As you can imagine, seafood is king there, and shrimp and grits might be the supreme ruler of them all. Adding pimento cheese to those grits? Genius. I don’t know who thought of it first - it probably sprang from the collective consciousness of countless Southerners who know a good thing when they see it. Or taste it. But if you are one of those strange creatures like my friend Martina who doesn’t like cheese in her grits…I will pray for you.

Speaking of pimiento cheese. The recipe inspiration that most deserves recognition here is from the Red Truck Bakery Cookbook. I took a pie-making workshop with the author a year or two ago. I signed up for it because of the word “pie” in the title. It did not disappoint. There was indeed pie at the end, and it was excellent, but so was the author’s pimiento cheese - from a recipe handed down in his family.

In this recipe, can just toss some of the components of the cheese into the grits, or you can follow the link and make the actual pimiento cheese. Not only will you be able to use it in your grits, but you will have plenty left over to spread on some Ritz crackers for an amazing meal - I mean snack - later. I love options. Especially when they involve pimiento cheese.

One one last note. You might think, looking at the ingredient list, that the “garnishes” of tomato and scallions are optional. They really aren’t. Shrimp and grits tend toward the heavy side. The tomato and scallions lift the dish out of sink-into-your-couch-never-to-arise territory and make it fresh and sublime.

Blanching, peeling and seeding that there tomato? Not strictly necessary, but 100% advised if you want to take the dish into savage, classy, bougie territory. Because you are that bitch, are you not?

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Shit You Need

For the grits:

1. 1 cup quality stone-ground grits, such as Anson Mills

2. 4 1/2 cups water

3. 2 teaspoons crushed Calabrian chiles

4. 2 ounces cream cheese, softened

5. 4 ounces (1 1/2 cups) shredded sharp cheddar cheese

6. 2 ounces (3/4 cup) shredded pepper jack cheese

7. 1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika

8. 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Or, omit 3-7 and add 1 cup Pimiento Cheese instead.

For the shrimp:

1. 1 tablespoon olive oil

2. 12 ounces thick-cut bacon, cut crosswise into 1/4-inch strips

3. 1 1/2 pounds large shrimp, peeled and de-veined

4. 2 cloves garlic, minced

5. 1 teaspoon crushed Calabrian chiles

6. 1 bunch green onions, chopped, white and green parts separated (slice at a steep angle if you want to impress your friends)

7. 1/4 cup chopped fresh Italian parsley

8. one large heirloom tomato, blanched/skinned/seeded*, and sliced

*Drop the tomato into boiling water for one minute. Plunge into ice water, then peel by teasing up the skin with a paring knife. (Strangely satisfying, no?) Then cut the tomato in half crosswise, and give it a gentle squeeze over the sink to expel most of the seeds.

Smoky, spicy, delicious pimiento cheese.

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Keep Calm and justeffingcook

1. Bring the 4 1/2 cups of water to a boil in a large saucepan. Add a teaspoon of kosher salt and a few grinds of pepper, then whisk in the grits. Turn the heat to medium low, cover and cook 15 minutes, whisking occasionally.

2. Meanwhile, heat the olive oil in a skillet and cook the bacon until golden and starting to crisp at the edges. Set aside on paper towels to drain.

3. In the same pan, cook half the shrimp in the bacon fat until just pink, about one minute on each side. Set aside, cook the other half of the shrimp, and set these aside with the first batch.

4. Add the garlic, chiles, and white parts of the scallions to the skillet and cook over low heat until fragrant.

5. When the grits have cooked 15 minutes, whisk in the chiles, cheeses, paprika and cayenne (if you are using the pimiento cheese you made, congrats! And whisk that in instead.)

6. Return the shrimp and bacon to the skillet with the aromatics, and heat through. Add half the parsley and green scallions and combine.

7. Serve the shrimp and bacon over the grits, garnishing with the rest of the parsley and scallions.

Pimiento Cheese

My life can be broken down into two distinct epochs: BPC and APC. Before pimiento cheese and after pimiento cheese. After was a material improvement over the Before Times.

Pimiento cheese is easy and quick and effing delicious. This version adds smoky and spicy to the descriptors thus achieving the total package. It’s inspired by The Red Truck Bakery’s recipe, which in turn was handed down from the author’s Aunt Darla, who is evidently a genius.

So grab some cheese, raid the spice cabinet, pickle a few onions, and if you can find Duke’s mayo anywhere, buy it immediately. Find your favorite crackers and spread it thick. And while Ritz crackers are the traditional accompaniment, I love me some Wheat Thins.

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Shit You Need

1. 4 ounces cream cheese, softened

2. 1/2 cup mayonnaise, preferably Duke’s

3. 8 ounces grated cheddar cheese

4. 4 ounces grated pepper jack cheese

5. 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

6. 1 teaspoon smoked paprika

7. 2 teaspoons crushed Calabrian chiles

8. 1/4 cup quick-pickled onions, minced (see below)

9. 1/2 cup roasted red peppers, chopped finely

10. 2 tablespoons chopped fresh chives

Quick-pickled onions:

1. 1/2 large red onion, thinly sliced

2. 1/2 cup apple cider vinegar

3. 1/2 cup hot water

4. 2 teaspoons sugar

5. 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt

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Keep Calm and justeffingcook

1. Make the quick-pickled onions. Let them steep at least couple of hours before using.

2. Combine all the ingredients. I typically use my stand mixer. If you want to use a food processor, keep the grated cheese out until the very end. You want it chunky.

3. Let the mixture chill before using.

4. Spread on crackers and get comfortable. Hunker down and enjoy.

Rebecca’s Manhattan

If there are two things you have come to expect of me, they are 1. cursing and 2. making outlandish statements like how I invented the question mark.

So I know you will be skeptical when I tell you that Rebecca’s manhattan is the best in the whole fucking world. But that statement is not just on-brand, it is true.

So, here’s the story: My friend Rebecca has had a million manhattans and I have had a million manhattans (and not just in one sitting). Some were good and some sucked ass. As in too-sweet monstrosities with crushed ice or neon pink cherries or effing pineapple. Pineapple? Really???

And then one night she texted me with a recipe. “A manhattan”, she wrote. “A really good one.”

Tomasso, the manager at her favorite Italian restaurant had served her this and then was nice enough to give her the recipe. Rebecca, being the awesome person she is, and my bestie, followed this recipe by gifting me a bottle of Luxardo Sangue Morlacco, the key to this delightful concoction.

But don’t take only Rebecca’s and my recommendation. See the glowing reviews below:

“This is the best damn thing in the whole wide world.” - literally everyone.

See?

Now. How do you know if you are worthy of this Manhattan? Try to find a bottle of Luxardo Sangue Morlacco liqueur. If you can find one, you’re worthy.

Sangue Morlacco is a sweet cherry liqueur, not the maraschino liqueur the same company sells in the iconic basket-wrapped bottle. Both are outstanding but serve different purposes in cocktails.

One could say the Luxardo family knows cherries. I was hoping the company motto would be “Popping cherries since 1821” but I couldn’t find that anywhere on their website. Clearly they need me writing their copy.

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Shit You Need

1. 2.5 ounces rye

2. .5 ounces Sangue Morlacco liqueur

3. .5 ounces Cocchi Vermouth di Torino or Carpano Antica vermouth

4. Orange twist for garnish. This is not a slice of orange. This is a shaving of the orange rind without the white pith, “expressed” over the glass and then placed along the inside of the glass, so you get a bit of orange aroma as you drink.

5. Cocktail cherries, also for garnish. Find small ones in syrup so dark it almost looks black. Luxardo, Jack Rudy, and Filthy Food all make great ones.

I am a huge fan of bitters - I even make my own - but I do not use them here. Rye has great spicy and grass notes, and with the cherry against the orange, it’s perfect.

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Keep Calm and justeffingmix

1. Add rye, liqueur, and vermouth to a mixing glass. Add a generous few handfuls of ice and stir 30 sec.

2. Pour into a chilled glass (neat), or into a double old-fashioned glass with one large ice cube.

3. Place two cherries on a cocktail skewer and add to glass. Express a bit of the orange oil from the peel over the glass, and add the peel to the glass.

4. Enjoy with a glowing fire, ideally in a smoking jacket. Or, even better, a non-smoking jacket…you will live longer and enjoy many more manhattans that way.