Wednesday, December 19, 2007

A Boy and His Adobo

Among the many, many terrible versions of Christmas carols playing on satellite radio at work, somehow a rendition of "A Few of my Favourite Things" seems to have slipped in. I've never really considered the song a carol (correct me if I'm wrong), but regardless, it served as something of an inspiration. No, not for cream-coloured ponies or schnitzel with noodles - but Pork Adobo, one of Matt's favourite dishes.


Matt had been asking for this one for a long time, and I'm honestly not quite sure why I've been putting it off. I'm not generally a lazy cook, and this was far less time consuming than I remembered it being. That said, the last time I made it, it did fall a little flat. My dad usually does a version with beef short ribs, which I prefer, but Matt wanted pork, and I figured if I was going to try it again, I might as well do it more or less right.

The original recipe is from The New York Times, and is presented with very limited tweaking. I used boneless pork ribs, mostly because they were cheaper than the whole rack of baby back, but also because I'm a recovering vegetarian, and bones in my food weird me out. So does lard, as you may remember from my last post.

Pork Ribs Adobo
adaptedish from The New York Times

1 cup apple cider vinegar, preferably organic and unfiltered
1 tablespoon soy sauce
3 small bay leaves
1 large jalapeno chile, stemmed and roughly chopped
2 lbs baby-back pork ribs, (1 side, cut into individual ribs, or boneless ribs)
2 teaspoons sea salt
6 garlic cloves, peeled
2 teaspoons black peppercorns

In a bowl, combine vinegar, soy sauce, bay leaves and chile and set aside.

Season the ribs with 1 teaspoon salt. With a mortar and pestle or a small food processor, grind the remaining teaspoon salt with the garlic and peppercorns until it forms a rough paste. Rub past into ribs and transfer to a large ziploc bag. Pour in the vinegar mixtures, seal and refrigerate for at least 1 hour or overnight, turning occasionally.

Transfer ribs and marinade to a pot, bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 1 hour, until the meat is tender. (I let mine cook for more like an hour and a half, but I like the meat all shreddy, so take your pick). Remove ribs to a baking sheet and simmer sauce until thick.

Preheat the broiler, pour 1/4 cup of the thickened sauce over the ribs, turn to coat, and broil until nicely browned, about 7 minutes, turning once.

Serve over rice with the remaining sauce. Provide coarsely chopped tomato and onion to go along, if you like (it's tasty!)

And smile when you eat it - it makes the cook happy.

3 comments:

John J. Goddard said...

Awesome! Another Portland food blog! I'll be transplanting myself to Portland soon as well. You have been bookmarked!

John J. Goddard
Articles of Mastication

Annina said...

Hey! Just want to say, that I really like your blog and your recipes! Thank you very much!! I added you on my blog! Hope this is ok?!?! You can find your link under "good food pages" on the right side! (www.anninasfood.blogspot.com) Take care & happy new year!
Annina

Lisa Barrow said...

Shannon, I was amazed to find that this recipe uses no adobo sauce!

Maybe it's because I'm a (quite delightedly NOT "recovered") vegetarian, but that stuff is awesome, particularly for the umami of it all. Ever tried it?