Puerco Pibil

"This dish is, in fact, so good that I will have to go back into the kitchen and kill the chef. It's my little way of keeping balance in the world." --Johnny Depp playing Agent Sheldon Sands from Robert Rodriguez's film "Once Upon a Time in Mexico"

After watching Rodriguez's film on DVD (and seeing what an important role this particular meal had in it) I was curious as to what this food item was all about. Fortunately, as a bonus feature on the DVD, Rodriguez offered his "10 Minute Cooking School" where he takes you step-by-step how to make this delicious meal. Puerco Pibil is actually a derivative of a Mayan recipe that has survived into Mexican cuisine today. Literally meaning "pit or buried pork", the name harkens back to barbecuing an animal in a pit until its meat is falling off of the bone. Intrigued by Rodriguez's recipe, I set about looking for ingredients and begged my wife to let me make it for her.
As I searched the local grocery stores looking for anatto seed and banana leaves, I received many an awkward look from store employees and management alike. Thinking that my pursuit of culinary bliss was vanquished without access to these ingredients, I summarily gave-up and shelved the recipe for another day. Sooner rather than later, however, I was taking a long weekend with my family over at Lake Chelan for the annual Winemakers' Dinner. This was a feast that I will recall in another posting, though! While shopping for some groceries at a local supermarket, I stumbled upon my four-leaf clover of spices: anatto! The essential ingredient in Achiote Paste, this Caribbean seed is tough to find outside of Latino neighborhoods; fortunately, Chelan has a large population of Mexican people, and therefore the stores cater to their tastes. Now if they only carried banana leaves, I'd be in business... Eureka! Frozen banana leaves! Needless to say, the store needed to order more of both after we cleaned them out.
Now, back on the west side of the mountains, I gathered the remaining ingredients and faced the daunting challenge of turning this mess of seemingly disparate food items into culinary gold. Note to self, don't touch eye after slicing habeneros for at least two days...trust me on this one! So, here's how we dance:

Puerco Pibil, as adapted from Robert Rodriguez's "10 Minute Film School"

4-5 pounds boneless pork shoulder (pork butt), trimmed and cut into 2 inch cubes
7 cloves of fresh garlic, smashed
2 habanero peppers, seeded and diced
1/2 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/2 cup orange juice
1/2 cup white vinegar
Healthy dose of quality tequila or mezcal
2 1/2 Tbs anatto seed
2 tsp cumin seed
8 allspice berries
1/2 tsp whole cloves
1 Tbs black peppercorns
2 Tbs Kosher salt
Banana leaves

Preheat oven to 325 F. Place all whole spices into spice grinder and grind until all are moderately powdered. Place all liquid ingredients in a blender with garlic, peppers, salt, and spices. Blend until smooth. Place pork chunks in a zip-top bag and pour blender contents into the bag. Seal tightly and ensure no air is in the bag. Massage bag for a few moments to evenly distribute spices. Line a large baking dish with banana leaves, and make sure some leaves hang over the sides. Pour contents of bag into dish and fold over banana leaves. Cover with a few more leaves, and then wrap tightly with aluminum foil. Bake for 4 hours and serve with sauce over Spanish rice.

The blend of spices with the heat of the habaneros and the acidity of the liquid ingredients combine with heat to break-down the connective tissues in the pork and render one of the most flavorful meals around. Getting the freshest spices and grinding them yourself is the key to making your taste buds soar. If you can't take the heat of habaneros, serranos or even jalapenoes could be substituted without a real loss of flavor. Also, Rodriguez insists on using top shelf tequila (this is why, he surmises, that the chef is shot for making the dish with such good tequila), but I'd rather use Cuervo Gold and save the really good stuff (Cabo Wabo!) for my scratch margaritas (a topic I may have to broach on another day).
My wife loved this dish so much, she said it's now her favorite meal! She even talked our butcher into getting 25 pounds of pork butt to freeze so I can make it for her whenever she wants. If that isn't an endorsement, I don't know what is! What is strange about this dish is that it would be equally at home on a cold winter's night as well as a hot summer evening. I first made it in November, and it had a very comforting quality about it; this was hearty comfort food to help keep warm on a blustery, wet Seattle night. The earthy tone of the anatto (not to mention the cool, surface of Mars color) really grounds the dish, and the cloves and allspice give a hint of sweet contrast. Fantastic. Fork tender pork simmered and steamed inside banana leaves is an amazingly satisfying meal. I urge you to try it for yourself. Don't worry, we won't shoot the chef.