Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Cuban Pork for Next Thanksgiving

Every Thanksgiving for the past decade or more, my family has gathered around the dining room table for our annual Thanksgiving feast: Cuban Pork.
I had lost my taste for turkey and had been searching for a substitute roast when I came across a recipe for Cuban Pork in one of the cooking magazines to which I subscribe. I’m not sure which one. When my daughter, Carol, recently asked me for the recipe, I did what everyone does in search of information, I turned to the internet.
I found the exact same recipe I have been using on MASSrecipes.com. Recipe:
Pierna De Puerco Asada (Roasted Fresh Ham)
SERVES 10- 15
Unsmoked (fresh) ham makes a delicious roast pork.
1 15-18 lb. fresh ham on the bone
Juice of 12 bitter oranges or 8 sweet oranges and 4 limes
1 head garlic, cloves separated, peeled, and minced
Pinch dried oregano
Salt

Trim off ham's outer skin and score fat about 1/2 inch deep in a diamond
pattern. Put ham in a roasting pan and set aside. Mix juice, garlic, and
oregano in a bowl and season to taste with salt. Reserving 1/2 cup, pour
juice mixture over ham, rubbing garlic into scored fat. Cover with plastic
wrap and refrigerate overnight.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Remove plastic wrap, then bake ham, basting occasionally with reserved juice mixture, until internal temperature reaches
170° on a meat thermometer, about 5 hours. Allow to rest 20 minutes before carving.

Note: We serve the Cuban Pork with black beans and rice. My recipe for the black beans:
Three cans of Bush’s black beans; two cans of chopped tomatoes; three packets of Goya spices that is “Sazon Goya sin achiote”; chop up two onions and two peppers.
Sauté the onions and pepper briefly. Add rest of the ingredients. Bring to a boil and simmer for 15 minutes.
Best consumed with a pinot noir or a dry white wine. My sons prefer beer. If you can find it, try Polar Beer—once brewed in Cuba, now Venezuela.
I fell in love with Cuban food back in 1971 when the Newsday Investigative Team spent three months in the Miami area as part of an investigation of President Richard Nixon’s pal, Bebe Rebozo.

A suggestion: My novel, THE PENCIL ARTIST is available as an e-book on Smashwords, Kindle, and Barnes and Noble; as a paperback on Amazon.


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