Editor's note: Chef, nutritionist, and cooking teacher Lourdes Castro shared this recipe from her cookbook, Latin Grilling. It's a classic Cuban dish and the centerpiece of a festive party menu she created for Epicurious. If you have leftover pork, Castro recommends making Grilled Cuban Sandwiches .
Cubans love their pork. It's hard to find a Cuban or Cuban-American who doesn't have a memory of spending hours waiting for a lechon, a whole pig, to finish cooking in someone's backyard, and then sharing it with family and friends (I am certainly no exception). What sets Cuban-style pork apart is the use of mojo criollo, a highly seasoned marinade made up of tangy citrus juice, vast amounts of garlic, cumin, and oregano. And while roasting a whole pig is deliciously fun, smaller cuts are far more manageable and easier to work with.
Ingredients
Seville oranges
A Seville orange is a bitter orange that is sometimes referred to as a sour orange. Its thick skin is pale yellow and its flesh contains many seeds. Due to its very sour taste, it is not an eating orange. In the event you cannot find Seville oranges, substitute a 2:1 ratio of lime juice and regular orange juice.
Techniques
Flavor injector
Cuban-style pork is very well seasoned both inside and out. A flavor injector, a kitchen tool that resembles a needle and syringe, is used to marinate the interior flesh of thick cuts of pork. If you do not have one, simply make deep gashes with a thin knife all over the meat and pour the marinade over and into the cuts.
Injecting the flesh
To prevent the garlic from getting stuck in the injector tip, strain half of the marinade and use that in the injector.
When you inject the marinade into the pork, you will see a bulge appear close to the site of the injection. That is the marinade settling into the flesh. When the pork is cooked, you may see pockets of darker flesh in the areas where the marinade was injected; this is normal.
Freezing citrus juice
Because I use so much citrus juice in my cooking and insist on using only juice from fresh fruit, I always freeze leftover juice from recipes or from fruit that is just about to go bad for future use. If placed in an airtight container, citrus juice will keep for a few months. Simply thaw at room temperature before using.
Advance preparation
The marinade can be made a day in advance. All cuts can be left marinating for 24 hours.
Recipe notes
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