Lechón Asado

Cuba's whole pig marinated overnight in sour orange, garlic and oregano, then roasted for hours in a wooden box until the skin blisters

Origin: Havana & Cuba

From the journey of Orange.

Lechón asado is the centre of Cuban Christmas Eve, Nochebuena, and of every large gathering that can justify a whole animal. The pig is marinated overnight in mojo, roasted slowly for five or six hours, and carved with the skin lifted off in sheets and broken up so that everyone gets a piece of chicharrón. The marinade is the dish. Mojo criollo is sour orange juice, an enormous quantity of crushed garlic, dried oregano, cumin, and salt, poured over hot oil at the end so that the garlic sizzles. The sour orange, naranja agria, is Citrus × aurantium, the bitter Seville orange, brought to the Caribbean by the Spanish and naturalised across the islands; it is sharper and more aromatic than a lime and less sweet than a sweet orange, and its acidity both seasons the meat and begins to tenderise it overnight. Where it is unavailable, Cuban cooks mix two parts orange juice to one part lime and one part grapefruit, which is a close approximation and is entirely standard in Miami. The Cuban-American diaspora contributed the equipment. The Caja China, a plywood box lined with aluminium in which the pig roasts underneath a tray of charcoal on the lid, was developed in Miami in the 1980s and works by roasting the animal with heat from above; it cooks a whole pig in four hours instead of eight and gives the crackling that the traditional spit struggles to achieve evenly. The name refers to Chinese-Cuban labourers in Havana, though the box itself is Floridian. What follows is the shoulder version, which is what a domestic oven can manage and what most Cuban households actually cook outside the holidays.

Ingredients

Pork

4 kg pork shoulder with the skin on, bone in

Mojo

500 ml sour orange juice, or 250ml orange, 125ml lime and 125ml grapefruit
2 heads garlic, cloves crushed to a paste with salt
3 tbsp dried oregano
1 tbsp ground cumin
2 tbsp salt
1 tbsp coarsely ground black pepper
2 onions, thinly sliced

Finishing mojo

150 ml olive oil
1 head garlic, thinly sliced
200 ml sour orange juice
1 tsp salt

To finish

1 handful flat-leaf parsley, chopped

Method

Score the pork skin in a diamond pattern, cutting through the skin and fat but not into the meat, and pierce the flesh deeply all over with a knife.
Pierce it properly and in many places. The marinade has to reach the middle of a four-kilogram joint and it cannot do that through an unbroken surface.
Crush the garlic to a paste with salt in a mortar, then mix it with the sour orange juice, oregano, cumin, salt, and pepper.
Rub the mojo into the meat, forcing it into every cut, and put the sliced onions over and under the joint.
Cover and refrigerate for at least twelve hours and up to twenty-four, turning it twice.
Bring the pork to room temperature, pat the skin dry, and salt it. Wet skin will not crisp, however long it is in the oven.
Roast skin side up at 150°C for four to four and a half hours, basting every hour with the marinade from the tin.
Cover the skin loosely with foil if it colours too fast in the first two hours, and take the foil off for the last hour.
Raise the oven to 230°C for a final twenty to thirty minutes, watching it, until the skin blisters and crackles all over.
Rest the joint for half an hour under a loose tent that does not touch the crackling.
For the finishing mojo, heat the olive oil until it shimmers, take it off the heat, add the sliced garlic and let it sizzle for thirty seconds, then pour in the sour orange juice and salt and stand back.
Pull the pork apart in coarse pieces rather than slicing it, break the crackling into shards, pour the hot mojo over, and serve with black beans, white rice, and fried ripe plantain.

Notes

Sour orange is the correct citrus; the orange, lime, and grapefruit mixture is the standard and accepted substitute. Pierce the meat deeply before marinating and give it a full night. Dry and salt the skin before roasting and finish under a high heat. The second mojo, made by pouring hot oil onto garlic and then citrus, is poured over at the table and is not optional. Leftovers become pan con lechón, the Cuban roast pork sandwich, which many people prefer to the original.

The Gastrographer

Name: Lechón Asado
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 5 h
Total time: 6 h
Yield: 10
Cuisine: Havana & Cuba
Ingredients: 4 kg pork shoulder with the skin on, bone in; 500 ml sour orange juice, or 250ml orange, 125ml lime and 125ml grapefruit; 2 heads garlic, cloves crushed to a paste with salt; 3 tbsp dried oregano; 1 tbsp ground cumin; 2 tbsp salt; 1 tbsp coarsely ground black pepper; 2 onions, thinly sliced; 150 ml olive oil; 1 head garlic, thinly sliced; 200 ml sour orange juice; 1 tsp salt; 1 handful flat-leaf parsley, chopped

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Journey Point Map Key

Ingredient originTrade or transit route

Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control