Chicharrón en Salsa

It goes into the sauce dry and is left to go soft on purpose, which is the opposite of everything the chicharrón page works for.

Pork. Not vegetarian — contains lard, pork.

Ingredients

• 250 g chicharrón, as on its own page, in large pieces
• 700 g tomatillos, husked
• 3 serrano chillies
• 3 cloves garlic
• ½ onion
• a sprig of epazote
• 2 tablespoons lard
• 300 ml water or stock
• 2 teaspoons salt
• corn tortillas, as on their own page, to serve

Method

1. IT GOES INTO THE SAUCE DRY AND IS LEFT TO GO SOFT ON PURPOSE, which is the opposite of everything the chicharrón page works for. That page spends a day drying and two fries getting a sheet of skin brittle and hollow; this one drops it into simmering salsa verde and waits for it to collapse. Within eight or ten minutes the pieces have drunk the sauce, lost every trace of crispness and gone soft, gelatinous and yielding -- and that is the dish. The chicharrón is acting as a sponge with an enormous surface area, and what it soaks up is tomatillo and chilli. Added at the last second to stay crisp, it is a bowl of sauce with crisps in it and the pieces go soggy unevenly anyway.
2. THE SAUCE MUST BE LOOSER THAN IT LOOKS. Three hundred millilitres of water or stock into the blended tomatillo. Two hundred and fifty grams of chicharrón will absorb a startling amount, and a sauce that looks right before it goes in will be a dry paste ten minutes later. It is better to start too thin and reduce.
3. IT GOES IN IN LARGE PIECES AND IS NOT BROKEN UP. Hand-sized sheets snapped in two or three. They shrink as they soften, and small pieces disappear into the sauce entirely; large ones end up as distinct soft folds that can be lifted into a tortilla.
4. IT IS NOT SALTED UNTIL THE CHICHARRÓN HAS BEEN IN TEN MINUTES. The chicharrón is heavily salted on its own page and gives most of that up into the sauce. Seasoned beforehand, the finished pan is reliably too salty and there is nothing to be done about it.
5. THE EPAZOTE GOES IN WHOLE AND STAYS. One sprig, in with the sauce, left in the pan. In a dish of this much pork fat and acid it is the one thing cutting through, and it stands up to ten minutes where coriander would not.
6. The tomatillos and chillies simmered in water 8 to 10 MINUTES, until they turn from bright green to olive. Drained.
7. Blended with the garlic and onion until smooth.
8. The lard heated in a wide pan and the blended sauce poured in. Cooked 8 MINUTES until darkened.
9. The water or stock stirred in with the epazote sprig. The sauce should look distinctly LOOSE -- thinner than seems right.
10. Brought to a simmer. NOT SALTED YET.
11. The chicharrón snapped into LARGE pieces and added DRY, pushed under the surface.
12. Simmered 8 to 10 MINUTES, turned once or twice.
13. WATCHED: the pieces should swell, drink the sauce and go completely SOFT and gelatinous. Any crispness means it needs longer.
14. ONLY NOW tasted and salted -- it will already be salty from the chicharrón.
15. Loosened with a splash more stock if it has gone dry, which it usually has.
16. Served with tortillas, lifted out in folds.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Mexico · All recipes