Cubano Sandwich
The original recipe: Cubanos from Chef by Binging with Babish
The original recipe above links to a YouTube video - but why?! Binging with Babish is a YouTube creator who makes instructional cooking videos based off of dishes inspired by movies or television. It's a really cool concept and his videos are both concise and entertaining, my husband and I love watching them!
As you'll see below, the "Sandwich" ingredients can vary. What we ended up with was in no way a legit Cubano sandwich, but it was delicious and hey, that's all we're looking for.
Serves 6-8
INGREDIENTS
Brine:
4 cups unsweetened, no-pulp orange juice
2 cups water
1/2 cup unseasoned rice wine vinegar
1/2 cup dark rum (original recipe calls for spiced rum, but we didn't have any)
1/2 cup salt
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 head of garlic, crushed
A few stems of fresh thyme, chopped
A few stems of fresh rosemary, chopped
A few stems of oregano, chopped
A few sage leaves, chopped
3 bay leaves
Marinade:
2 kg (approximate) boneless pork shoulder
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup cilantro, chopped
1/4 cup mint leaves, chopped
Juice & zest from 3 navel oranges
Juice & zest & "carcasses" of 6 limes
1 head of garlic, crushed
A few stems of oregano, chopped
2 tbsp cumin
2/3 tsp salt
2/3 tsp ground black pepper
Sandwich (feel free to tailor this to your own liking!):
Bread - We used two Calabrese buns that were large enough for about 6 portions. The recommendation is to use Cuban bread, but I couldn't find any!
Mustard - We used regular yellow mustard, but I'm thinking next time a dijon would taste great
Swiss cheese
Pickles, sliced thinly - We used a mandolin to slice these
Sliced ham - We just bought 200g of old fashioned ham from the deli
Bacon - OK, this isn't part of the recipe at all but we added it the second night of eating this and it, as bacon usually does, made it even better. We used about 4 slices of regular bacon.
Mayonnaise - Also not part of the regular recipe and purists would berate me for this, but this extra fat and moisture was a saving grace. Maybe it would have been different if we were able to find the softer, eggier Cuban bread to use.
Butter - Lots of unsalted butter for toasting the bread!
DIRECTIONS
Brine the pork - do this the day before you want to eat the sandwich!
1. Depending on the cut of your pork, remove the skin if there is any. Then score the fat with a knife and place in a large bowl with all the brine ingredients. Cover & refrigerate; brine for a minimum of 12 hours and ensure the whole piece of meat is fully submerged. We left ours for just over 24 hours.
Marinate the pork - do this at least 5 hours before you want to eat.
2. Remove the pork from the brine and pat dry.
3. Combine all the marinade ingredients in a large bowl and place the pork in, massaging the marinade into the pork.
4. Cover & refrigerate for at least 2 hours.
Roast the pork.
5. Preheat the oven to 350F.
6. Remove the pork from the marinade and remove any large chunks of..well, the various items in there (eg. herbage).
7. Roast on a wire rack that's placed over top a rimmed baking sheet until the internal temperature reaches 165F. The inside will be a light pink, and yes, that is safe to eat as long as the internal temperature is high enough! This took about 3 hours for us.
8. Set the pork aside to let cool and prep your sandwich ingredients. Once the pork is cool enough, slice what you need for the sandwich(es).
Sandwich assembly.
9. Cook your bacon in a pan.
10. While the bacon cooks, slice your bread, butter both the inside & outside, and toast using a panini press.
11. Once the bacon is cooked to your liking, remove onto a plate lined with paper towel, and keep at least 1 tbsp of the bacon grease in the pan.
12. In the pan with bacon grease, fry up the slices of ham and the slices of pork (from step 8).
13. Slice your pickles and cheese (if not already pre-sliced) - now you're ready to assemble!
14. Spread mayo and mustard on top and bottom slices of bread.
15. Top with the pork, ham, cheese, bacon, and lastly, the pickles.
16. Place sandwich in the panini press and squish down, toasting for a few minutes until the cheese is melty.
17. Slice on the diagonal and enjoy the fruits of your labour!
