Cuban Mojo

Canary Islander emigrants carried mojo (from Portuguese molho, sauce) to Cuba during the colonial era — the pepper-and-vinegar Canarian mojos became the Cuban citrus version once Seville bitter orange (Citrus aurantium) took to the island's soil, retuned with oregano and cumin. The exact date it entered Cuban cookery is unrecorded, but by the mid-19th century it was an everyday Havana staple, the era of Cuba's earliest printed cookbooks. (A widely repeated claim that it was 'documented by Domingo del Monte in 1857' is unreliable — del Monte died in 1853; the first Cuban cookbook, the Manual del Cocinero Cubano, appeared around that year.)

True naranja agria has a 5-7% acidity (vs. 2-3% for navel orange). If unavailable, the Versailles Restaurant Miami substitution is 2 parts orange juice + 1 part lime + 1 part grapefruit. Hold the marinade overnight on a 5-lb pork shoulder; the citric acid penetrates 1cm in 12 hours.

Pale gold, garlicky and pungent, sharp acid. Raw garlic up front, then cumin and oregano warmth, finished by the bitter-floral tang of naranja agria — a flavor American sour orange can't fake. Served warm over yuca, drowning lechón.

Bloom garlic in hot oil 30 sec — not brown — then crash with the cold bitter-orange juice; the thermal shock arrests the maillard and emulsifies the oil into the acid. Cumin and oregano go in the cold juice before the pour.