Fragrant Oven-Steamed Pork

Barbacoa de Puerco

Preparation info
  • Makes

    8–10

    servings
    • Difficulty

      Easy

Appears in
Zarela's Veracruz: Mexico's Simplest Cuisine

By Zarela Martínez

Published 2001

  • About

In some versions of Veracruzan barbacoa, the meat is wrapped in individual packets and steamed over boiling water. Teresa Pérez Cabrera, a former chef at Las Brisas del Mar, gave me this alternative version, in which the meat cooks in a large lidded casserole or Dutch oven, lined with a double thickness of banana leaves and hoja santa to keep in the perfumed steam. The pot must be very tightly closed to keep the steam from escaping; in Veracruz, cooks sometimes seal the edges