Chilorio Sinaloense de Mocorito

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Heavy 6-quart pot for simmering the pork
• •Cast iron comal or heavy skillet for toasting chiles
• •High-powered blender
• •Fine-mesh strainer
• •Wide heavy skillet or clay cazuela for the final fry

Instructions

1. 1

   Simmer the pork

   Place the pork shoulder in a heavy pot. Add the onion half, two of the garlic cloves, the bay leaf, and the salt. Cover with water by an inch. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat. Skim the gray foam that rises in the first fifteen minutes. Lower the heat and cook at lazy bubbles for about two hours, until the meat shreds easily with a fork. Cold water start, slow simmer. A rolling boil tightens the meat and clouds the fat you are about to render.

   The chilorio cooks in pork shoulder, not loin, not tenderloin. You need the collagen and the fat. Lean pork gives you dry chilorio and dry chilorio is a failure.
2. 2

   Shred the meat and reserve the broth

   Lift the pork out with a slotted spoon and let it rest until cool enough to handle. Strain and reserve one cup of the cooking broth. Shred the pork by hand into rough threads, the way the senoras in Mocorito do it. Not a fine mince. Not large chunks. Threads. The texture matters because every strand will catch the adobo in the next step.

3. 3

   Toast the chiles

   Heat a dry comal or heavy skillet over medium. Toast the guajillo, pasilla, and ancho chiles separately, about 30 seconds per side. The skin will puff and the kitchen will smell like a Sinaloan despensa in autumn. The pasilla burns the fastest. Watch it. Burned chile turns the adobo bitter and there is no recovering from it later.

4. 4

   Soak and build the adobo

   Place the toasted chiles in a heatproof bowl and cover with hot tap water. Hot, not boiling. Let them soften for 20 minutes. Drain and transfer to a blender. Add the remaining two garlic cloves, the cumin seeds, oregano, peppercorns, cloves, vinegar, and 3/4 cup of the reserved pork broth. Blend on high for two full minutes until completely smooth. Strain through a fine-mesh sieve, pressing on the solids with a spoon. The adobo should coat the back of the spoon. The vinegar is what made chilorio a preserved food in the first place. Do not skip it.

   Some cooks in Mocorito add a small piece of Mexican chocolate or a teaspoon of brown sugar to round out the adobo. Optional, but if your chiles taste sharp, this is the trick the abuelas use.
5. 5

   Render the lard and fry the pork

   In a wide heavy skillet or cazuela, melt the lard over medium heat until it shimmers. Add the shredded pork in one layer. Fry without stirring for three or four minutes so the bottom edges turn golden, then stir and let another side catch. La manteca es el sabor. This is where chilorio earns its color and its texture. The pork should be lightly crisped at the edges before the adobo touches it.

6. 6

   Marry the pork and the adobo

   Pour the strained adobo over the pork. It will sputter. Stir to coat every thread. Lower the heat to medium-low and cook uncovered for 20 to 25 minutes, stirring every few minutes, until the adobo has soaked into the meat and the lard begins to separate around the edges of the pan. The chilorio is ready when it is dark, glossy, and almost dry, with a thin slick of red-stained fat at the bottom of the pan. That fat is the preservative. That is what kept this dish alive for travelers and ranch hands for three centuries before refrigeration.

7. 7

   Rest and serve

   Pull the pan off the heat and let the chilorio rest for ten minutes. The flavor settles. Serve in flour tortillas, the way they do it across Sinaloa, with refried beans, raw white onion, and lime. A spoonful of chilorio on a plate of beans and eggs is the classic Sinaloan breakfast. Asi se hace y punto.

Chef Tips

• •If you can find true Sinaloan chilorio at a Mexican market, taste it before you make your own. The benchmark matters. The texture should be threaded, not pasty, and the color deep brick red, not muddy brown.
• •Use a quality manteca de cerdo. Industrial hydrogenated lard from the supermarket baking aisle is not the same thing. Buy rendered pork lard from a Mexican butcher, or render your own from pork fatback. La manteca es el sabor and bad lard ruins the dish.
• •Chilorio is meant to be made in batches. Double the recipe and pack the extra into clean glass jars, cover the surface with a thin layer of melted lard, and refrigerate. It keeps for three weeks and the flavor only deepens. This is the original way the dish was stored and it still works.
• •Northern Mexico eats chilorio in flour tortillas, with refried beans, with eggs at breakfast, stuffed into burritos. Do not put it in a corn tortilla. That is not how Sinaloa eats it. No me vengas con atajos.

Advance Preparation

• •Chilorio is a make-ahead dish by design. It can be made up to four days ahead, refrigerated, and reheated in a skillet with a teaspoon of lard. The flavor improves on day two.
• •For longer storage, pack the cooled chilorio into clean glass jars, cover the surface with a quarter-inch of melted lard, seal, and refrigerate up to three weeks. This is the traditional preservation method from Mocorito.
• •Chilorio also freezes well for up to three months. Thaw in the refrigerator overnight and reheat in a skillet.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 145g)