Once upon a time

in Mexico.

A dude named Roberto Rodriguez decided he wanted to make movies (okay, no, it wasn't Mexico, it was Texas, but that didn't work with the titles). And he made some awesome flicks. Low budget, strong characters, bizarre and yet entirely believable plotlines... including, in one, a scene in which one character kills another because he made his dinner too good.

I'm not kidding.

Killed him right there in the kitchen as he stood over the stove.

Brilliant.

Wanna know what he made?

Puerco Pibil

according to Roberto Rodruiguez (srsly, watch the video)

What you need:

• 5 tbsp annatto, aka achiote, seeds (or about 3 tbsp pre-ground, which is what I used)
• 2 tsp cumin seeds
• 1 tbsp peppercorns
• 8 whole allspice seeds
• 1/2 tsp whole cloves
• 2 hatch, anaheim, or poblano chiles (or habanero if you're feeling spicy)
• 1/2 cup orange juice
• 1/4 cup white vinegar
• 1/4 c white wine vinegar
• 1 tsp salt
• 8 cloves garlic
• juice of 4 limes (or lemons, or some combination thereof)
• 2 oz tequila (or jalapeno wine, or some other booze that you like to have with mexican food)
• 5 lb of pork butt (also known as shoulder)

What you gotta do:

Grind the spices in a coffee grinder, or do it old school in a mortar and pestle.

Combine everything else, except the pork, in the food processor and whiz until it's nice and liquidy. No chunks allowed!

Dump the ground up spices into the food processor and use it to mix them in. Annatto is one of those fabulous spices that's often used as a natural food colour. The Kashi granola bars I bought last week have "annatto colour" listed as the last ingredient. And holy crap, no kidding. This dish would just not be the same without it.

Okay, so, I left out the lime juice so I could get a nice pic of something being poured into something else. This recipe is apparently a little too easy. I had to add steps so I could make food porn.

Chop the butt into 1-2 inch chunks. You can trim some of the fat from the meat if you want to, but you don't have to.

Mix the pork butt into the fabulous saucey marinade.

Um, there wasn't room in the fridge for the giant bowl, so I transferred everything to a 9 x 13 pan. You're going to cook the whole thing, marinade and all, so you may as well let it marinate in that pan.

Let the pork marinate for at least a few hours or as much as a whole day. This is one of those dishes you can put together at night, and toss into the crock pot in the morning. In fact, I think next time I make it, I'll use the crock pot just to prove it.

If you really want to, you can line your baking dish with banana leaves first. If you can find them. Mine were in the frozen section, but if your regular grocery doesn't have them, try an Asian market. Apparently they can be plentiful in groceries that specialize in Thai food...

I didn't do the leaf thing. I just covered mine completely and tightly with a double layer of heavy duty foil. You want to keep as much moisture in as possible. You aren't roasting so much as you are stewing in the oven.

After about 4 hours at 250F it's absolutely fork tender. Falls apart when you try to stab it.

Now, if you can resist temptation, let this sit in the fridge overnight again.

Apparently, there are people in Recipe Guy's house who can't resist temptation.

Shred the meat with a couple forks and stir it into the fabulous spiced juices.

Serve over rice, and top with tomatoes and cilantro.

What movie recipe would you like to see made??

Open Faced Pie In Your Face

So, half way through studying for my fluid mechanics final, I realized I needed to write a blog post. And the only thing in my fridge is a jar of pickles, a bag of dried out baby carrots, and half a bottle of wine.

I did however have three very ripe pears...

Pear Tart

(yup, that's all the intro you get; it's finals time)

What you need:

• 1/3 c butter
• 1/3 c sugar
• 2/3 c flour
• 3 pears
• 1 tbsp wine

Okay, I thought I was being extremely clever with all of the threes until I realized I'd managed to lose my 1/3 cup measure. How the hell does someone lose a measuring cup?? And no, it's not buried somewhere in a stack of dirty dishes. I actually washed them all yesterday. :P

What you gotta do:

Preheat the oven to 400.

Make sure your butter is very soft. Cream it with the sugar.

If you wanted to do some fancy tricks with this, try a bit of lemon or lime zest in here. You could also replace up to half the butter with cream cheese if you have any. I didn't.

I really hate measuring dry stuff in my liquid measure. Liquid measuring cups are made for liquids. No, I'm not just being fussy. They're designed to account for the surface tension of liquids and how it affects how we see and perceive the level in the cup.

Mix in the flour until just combined. Your dough should be soft and sticky and you should need a bit of flour on your hands as you press it down onto the parchment.

Mine was a bit too dry. I'd like to blame it on the cup, but I may end up having to cut the flour down to 1/2 cup. Try it that way. Let me know how it works.

Peel and slice your pears. If you want to be all fancy with them, and try to segment the to get all the wedges the same size, that's your choice. Me, I'm okay with different sizes. It's "rustic". Yeah, rustic. We'll call it that.

Toss the pear slices in a bowl with the wine, or lemon juice, or lime juice. Lemon juice on the pears and lemon zest in the crust would work nicely, I think. I didn't have lemon. I had booze.

Pile the pears on the crust in as artful, or as "rustic" (not messy, rustic) a manner as you want or have patience for.

Bake this at 400 for about 20 minutes. The crust will be nice and browned, the pears soft and juicy and just starting to brown a bit on top.

Pull the parchment off the cookie sheet and onto a cooling rack. This giant pear covered cookie (really, that's kinda what it is) will be very soft. Let it cool to room temperature before you even think about cutting it.

(do some calculus while you wait)

If you don't have any cream to whip, a bit of thick vanilla yogurt works just fine.

What's your favourite kind of pie?