In Search of the Perfect Cochinita Pibil

Imagine tender pulled pork, a slightly citric, garlicky sauce, with hints of cumin and the brush of a pepper that you can’t quite identify. Now add red onion and habanero peppers soaked in lime juice to make them sharp and spicy – bringing tears to your eyes. Are you crying because it burns? Or because you imagine that you might never taste anything so good again for the rest of your life? That’s the way it is when you fall in love with cochinita pibil.

A small stand with no official name sits in the far back of two rows of food carts under a pedestrian bridge in Las Lomas de Chapultepec, Mexico City. The stand belongs to Sylvia, a tiny 50-something Mexican woman with the first streaks of silver shining in her hair. Mely and Rosy are behind the grill. Every day around 1 pm, office workers fill this tiny gastronomic corridor and patrons shout to make their orders heard over the vendors’ cries of tacos, chilaquiles, and tortas. Sylvia and her workers serve lots of Mexican favorites, but their hidden secret is the cochinita pibil.

Just 50 pesos (around 4 dollars) will get you a plate of four cochinita tacos with a side of rice and beans that you will never be able to finish. Ever felt like you’ve died and gone to heaven?

That is Sylvia’s cochinita.

After the very first bite, I was hooked and determined to find out everything about it and sample it everywhere I went.

The recipe comes from the Yucatan peninsula area of Mexico and it is a mestizo dish that took shape when the indigenous Yucatecos combined their local spices with slow-roasted pork – a protein introduced by the Spanish.

At David’s taco stand (right) in the city of Veracruz, a gaggle of servers and cooks fill the space behind the tiny outdoor kitchen. An old man plays a makeshift drum and harmonica while diners are served tightly rolled pulled-pork tacos with a cochinita broth poured on top. Cochinita tacos are a breakfast food in the port. The flavor is light, subtle and delicious, but nothing like Sylvia’s.

I decide I have to try the recipe for myself. Jose and Michelle, two friends and Mexico City natives are sure that we can make something just as good as what I’ve tasted. After hours of lime and orange squeezing, habanero chopping, and meat marinating, we finally sit down to dinner. The flavor is right, the meat tender, but it’s not the creamy cochinita I have been dreaming about.

Next up, the search continues for the perfect cochinita pibil…

So I go home to Chicago. I order banana leaves from a local Mexican supermarket, dust off my parents’ giant crockpot and convince myself I can do better. I try again, this time grinding homemade achiote paste, squeezing fresh oranges for the juice and marinating the meat overnight. The achiote is a tropical shrub whose fruit is a red and hairy teardrop-shaped husk with seeds inside that are hard as tiny pieces of gravel. They are incredibly tough to grind and will dye everything in sight red if you’re not careful.

It’s a complete disaster. The pork has soaked up all the juice and even lime-soaked onions and peppers can’t redeem it. The only saving grace is that no one knows how it’s supposed to taste – no one except me.

Back in Mexico City I try cochinita with beans; cochinita from the market; leftover cochinita; nothing is satisfying. So I go back to Sylvia. She’s surprised to see me after almost two months. She asks if I have another job in the neighborhood.

“I came back for the cochinita,” I said. “I haven’t been able to find anything as good as yours. I’m begging you to tell me the secret.” She laughs at my obsession. “Ok,” she said. “Here’s what I do…”

Four days later I am making it in my kitchen. I am praying to the god of chefs. I have 8 people coming for dinner. For cochinita pibil, my cochinita pibil. A mix of all the recipes and versions I have tried.

After hours of taste tests and worry… it turns out beautifully. Creamy, citrusy, and with just the right bite. It was worth all the “arduous research” and all the failed attempts. I’m back in love.

If you don’t want to bother with making your own and happen to be in Mexico, there are a ton of places where you can get cochinita pibil (even if you aren’t in the Yucatan). Check out El Rincon de Maya in Las Lomas at 416 Barriloca Street or Habanerito at 38 Manzanillo Street in La Roma. Still, nothing holds a candle to Sylvia’s – right off of Reforma Avenue past the “Fuente de Petróleos.” If you’re adventurous, here’s the recipe.

Get the recipe for authentic achiote paste and almost as good as Sylvia’s cochinita pibil…

Achiote Paste 

• 2 tablespoons of achiote seeds
• 1 teaspoon of cumin
• 1 teaspoon of allspice
• 1/2 teaspoon of black pepper 
• 1/2 teaspoon of oregano
• 1 teaspoon of coriander 
• 4 cloves
• 1 pinch of nutmeg
• 1 pinch of salt
• 2 Chiles Habaneros 

Get the full recipe. 

Cochinita Pibil  

• banana leaves
• 5 1/2 pounds pork shoulder
• 1 red onion
• 6 habanero peppers
• 4 limes
• 6 Seville (bitter) oranges
• 4 ounces achiote pase
• half a large head of garlic
• 4 1/4 cups chicken stock (preferably homemade)
• 3 3/4 cups fresh orange juice

Get the full recipe.