Chilorio con Huevo Estilo Mocorito

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Heavy 6-quart Dutch oven or wide cazuela
• •Cast iron comal for toasting the chiles
• •High-powered blender
• •Fine-mesh strainer for the chile paste
• •Large cast iron or carbon steel skillet for the eggs
• •Wooden spoon or paddle for folding the eggs

Instructions

1. 1

   Simmer the pork

   Place the pork shoulder chunks in a heavy pot. Add the tablespoon of salt and just enough cold water to barely cover the meat. Bring to a low simmer over medium heat and cook uncovered for about an hour and a half. The water will reduce, the pork will turn tender, and what is left in the pot at the end will be meat sitting in its own rendered fat. This is how chilorio starts in Mocorito. Boil it in too much water and you wash the flavor down the drain.

   If your pork shoulder is very lean, the meat will go dry once the water cooks off. Add a couple of extra tablespoons of manteca de cerdo near the end. The pork has to fry in fat, not steam in air.
2. 2

   Toast and soak the chiles

   While the pork simmers, heat a dry comal over medium. Toast the chile ancho and chile guajillo separately, about 20 to 30 seconds per side. They should puff and turn fragrant, never blacken. Move them straight into a heatproof bowl and cover with hot tap water. Hot, not boiling. Let them soften for 20 minutes. Burned chile turns the chilorio bitter and there is no fixing it later.

3. 3

   Build the chile paste

   Drain the softened chiles. Place them in a blender with the garlic, toasted cumin seeds, oregano, peppercorns, cloves, vinegar, salt, and about half a cup of fresh water. Blend on high until completely smooth. The paste should be the color of dried tobacco, thick enough to coat a spoon but loose enough to pour. Pass it through a fine-mesh strainer to catch the chile skins. Discard the solids. This is the recado that defines chilorio. Half a cup of vinegar sounds like a lot. It is supposed to be.

4. 4

   Shred the pork

   Once the pork is fork-tender and the cooking water has cooked off, lower the heat. Use two forks or the back of a wooden spoon to shred the meat right in the pot. Work it until the chunks break into rough strands. The fat that rendered out is still in there. Leave it. La manteca es el sabor.

5. 5

   Fry the chilorio

   Add the half cup of manteca to the pot with the shredded pork. Raise the heat to medium. Pour in the chile paste. It will sputter and the kitchen will fill with the smell of toasted chile and vinegar. Stir to coat every strand of meat. Cook for 20 to 25 minutes, stirring often, until the vinegar has cooked off, the paste has darkened, and the fat starts to separate at the edges of the pot. The chilorio is done when it pulls away from the bottom in a single mass and a wooden spoon dragged through it leaves a clean line. Taste for salt now. Asi se hace y punto.

   Properly cooked chilorio keeps in the refrigerator for two weeks under a layer of its own fat. The senoras in Mocorito have been preserving it this way long before refrigeration. Make a double batch.
6. 6

   Crisp the chilorio for breakfast

   For each serving of huevo con chilorio, scoop about half a cup of chilorio into a hot skillet over medium-high heat. Spread it in a thin layer and let it sit undisturbed for two minutes. The bottom will catch and turn dark and crusty. That crust is what you are after. This is the breakfast version, not the stew. Stir once to break up the crust and let another side catch.

7. 7

   Fold in the eggs

   Crack the eggs into a bowl, add the salt, and beat just enough to break the yolks. Lower the heat under the chilorio to medium. Add the two tablespoons of manteca to the pan and let it melt around the meat. Pour the eggs over the chilorio. Wait ten seconds. Then pull the eggs across the pan with a wooden spoon in slow folds, the way the senoras do it on a wood stove. The eggs should set in soft, large curds streaked with the dark red of the chilorio. Pull the pan off the heat while the eggs still look a little wet. They finish cooking on the plate.

8. 8

   Serve with sobaqueras

   Spoon the huevo con chilorio onto a warm plate. Set a stack of warm sobaqueras in a cloth-lined basket beside it. Put the salsa de chiltepín, lime wedges, and a side of frijoles puercos on the table. People build their own burritos. A pour of café de talega from a clay jarro and that is breakfast in Mocorito. Recetas probadas y garantizadas.

Chef Tips

• •Buy a true bone-in pork shoulder if you can, even though this recipe calls for boneless. The bone goes into the simmering pot with the meat and adds body to the rendered fat. Pull it out before you shred. Lean cuts like loin will not work. You need the fat and the connective tissue.
• •Apple cider vinegar is the modern standard, but in Mocorito the older recipes call for vinagre de piña or vinagre de manzana that families fermented at home. If you have access to an unfiltered fruit vinegar, use it. The flavor is rounder and less sharp.
• •Chiltepín is the wild bird's-eye chile of the Sonoran desert, the size of a peppercorn, hotter than it has any right to be. For the table salsa, crush a few in a wooden chiltepinero with salt and a splash of lime. Do not substitute crushed red pepper flakes. They are not the same thing and they never will be.
• •Sobaqueras are made by stretching the dough across the back of the cook's forearm, which is where the name comes from. If you cannot find them, the largest hand-pressed flour tortillas you can buy from a tortilleria will work. Do not use the small commercial flour tortillas from the supermarket. Wrong size, wrong texture, wrong tradition.
• •If you cannot find dried chile ancho or guajillo locally, order them. Do not substitute chile powder or paprika. The recado is the dish. No me vengas con atajos.

Advance Preparation

• •The chilorio itself is the make-ahead. Cook a full batch and store it in glass jars under a layer of its own rendered fat. Refrigerated, it keeps for two weeks. The flavor only improves after the first day as the chile and vinegar settle into the meat.
• •The chile paste can be made up to three days ahead and refrigerated separately if you want to break the cooking into two sessions.
• •Sobaqueras are best the day they are pressed. If you must store them, wrap them in a clean cotton cloth and reheat on a hot dry comal for 20 seconds per side.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 330g)