A while ago, I found this recipe for a Yucatan Salsa:
https://www.diversivore.com/smoky-dried-chili-salsa-kuut-bi-ik/
I've been thinking of making it for a while now, but I wasn't sure what I would do with it because it is probably too spicy for me to just eat with tortilla chips.
I think that this recipe really isn't that far off from just the marinade for a Cochinita Pibil, at least in the sense that they both use garlic and bitter orange. It doesn't seem like a leap to just merge the two recipes together.
It seems a little unnecessary to add moritas if the pork is already going to be exposed to smoke and the food is typically served with a habanero-based salsa anyway. I am also worried that adding a lot of Chile de Arbol is going to make the meat too spicy.
Would this be a food crime?
by chaneg
4 Comments
Im not sure if it would taste like cochinita at the end, but there’s absolutely 0 chance it would be bad.
I’m not an expert, but in my experience Yucatan cuisine doesn’t use those dried chilies in their cuisine. So starting from that, the sauce on your website is all wrong, and does not look appetizing.
Following that, using them for cochinita pibil would change the entire profile taste in the cochinita, so it would be a completely different dish.
Do what you want, I hope someone who knows more could give you a better insight on the matter.
But for me is a no. And the website just talks about the smokiness of the dried chilies but not about the flavor profile, as it were non existent.
It’s an unusual suggestion, because like you said, cochinita pibil is served with fresh xnipec which is already pretty spicy. Like most taco proteins, the spice comes from the condiment (salsa) not the marinade.
So if I was you, I’d make the normal marinade without spice, and make the K’uut Bi Ik separately which you can use as the salsa instead of the xnipec.
My family is not from Yucatan, but the cochinita pibil recipe we follow every year is nothing like this. It does use dried chiles, but no habanero and nothing very spicy. The meat (and the marinade) is mild enough for the whole family to enjoy.
The salsa recipe you posted would result in a very citrusy, sour salsa. I would use about 10 chile de arbol and 2 moritas in my standard red salsa.
Chile de arbol and habanero have two very different flavor profiles and I don’t believe they can be freely substituted. Habanero have a much harsher mouth feel.