Juanma’s Puerto Rican Pernil Pork

My Puerto Rican dad Juan Manuel made a slow cooked Puerto Rican Pernil Pork for 12 hours on 250 degrees.

At the end he cranked up the heat to 500 degrees for 6 Minutes to get that signature crispy skin.

Check out the recipe below, along with a short video of how your pernil should look when finished. Buen Provecho!

Juanma's Puerto Rican Pernil Pork

Author: Juan Manuel Avila, A Day in the Bite

Recipe type: Pork

Cuisine: Puerto Rican

Prep time: 24 hours

Cook time: 12 hours

Total time: 36 hours

Serves: 8

My Puerto Rican dad Juan Manuel made a slow cooked Puerto Rican Pernil Pork for 12 hours on 250 degrees. At the end he cranked up the heat to 500 degrees for 6 Minutes to get that signature crispy skin.

Ingredients

Pork:
10 lb pork picnic shoulder (with bone in and skin on )
Adobo seasoning needed for a 10 lb pernil:
6 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed and smash enough to make a paste
2 tablespoons of dried oregano
3 tablespoons of salt
2 teaspoons of ground black pepper
1 teaspoon of ground cumin
1 tablespoon of vinegar
¼ cup of olive oil
mix ingredients together in bowl

Instructions

Completely wash and pat dry the pork.
make the adobo rub by mixing the adobo ingredients in a bowl
take a pairing knife and make cut slightly the top of the skin in a checkerboard pattern
take the knife or ice pick and poke holes around the sides and bottom of the pork about two inches deep.
Massage your adobo all over the pork, both around the surface and into the poked holes and into the cuts made on top of the skin
Wrap the pork tightly in plastic wrap and leave in fridge for 24-36 hours.
Leave pork on the counter-top for 2-3 hours to come to room temperature.
Preheat your oven to 250F.
Put pork on a rack inside a roasting pan
Once your oven is preheated, place into the oven and bake for 12.5 hours. If you have smaller sizes or bigger sizes, you will have to adjust accordingly. You essentially want the internal temperature to be 180 to 190F.
Remove the pork from the oven and cover with foil. Allow the pork to rest for 15 total minutes. Preheat oven to 500F.
Once pork is rested and oven at 500F, remove the foil tent from the pork and place into the oven.
(*optional here you can sprinkle some salt and garlic powder to flavor your skin, or spread some anchiote paste over the skin to give it a gorgeous orange color)
Put it back in for 6 minutes to get the crispy crunchy signature crackling skin.
Take the pork out of the oven and let rest for 15-20 minutes before slicing/digging in.