I never realized how often I ate tacos until I went away to college in the wastelands of the Virginia Blue Ridge Mountains, where there are no tacos. Only ham sandwiches. Over 19 years, I had become accustomed to a regular, steady, intake of Mexican food in the form of cheese enchiladas with chile con carne sauce, fresh, bright salsas with chunks of jalapeno and garlic, refried beans cooked with gallons of lard, and especially tacos. Not the pitiful, despairing mass-produced kind that come in a sterile yellow pre-formed shell and are filled with a mysterious, grainy meat by-product. But rather, soft, warm tortillas with tasty bits of char from being cooked over a flame filled with juicy meats – roasted, braised, grilled, fried – and topped with a colorful mix of salsa and fresh vegetables. Sometimes when I think about tacos, my eyes go black and I grope about blindly in all directions in the hopes that a plate of tacos will somehow materialize in front of me, allowing me to shovel them maniacally into my mouth like a crazed wolverine. This is rarely an effective strategy for producing tacos, so I’ve often resorted to making them for myself.
When I was growing up in Austin, I was particularly partial
to tacos al pastor, which are filled with orange chunks of slow-roasted pork, onions,
cilantro and pineapple. Customarily they are served with wedges of lime, and
you would be remiss not to take advantage of these. I’m sure that there are
many fine tacos al pastor in Austin, but I am particularly fond of the ones at
Guero’s (to the surprise of no one), and at Chango’s, where you can order them
with an insanely good watermelon agua fresca on the side. Here in Fort Worth,
Will and I love the ones at Melis Taqueria on Vickery. Theirs are served with
their house green sauce, which has sinister addictive properties.
3 large guajillo chiles, stemmed, seeded, and cut or torn into large chunks
1/2 c water
1 c chopped fresh pineapple (buy a whole pineapple so you can make the pineapple juice in the recipe that follows)
1/4 c white vinegar
1 tsp salt
2-3 cloves garlic, chopped (I'm a lazy hobo so I use the kind that comes in the big jar. Sorry, Bourdain.)
1/2 tsp dried oregano (Mexican, if you can find it)
1/4 tsp cumin
pinch ground cloves
1 1/2 lb thin pork chops or sliced pork shoulder
corn tortillas
For the taco toppings:
thick slices of pineapple (you'll be roasting them)
1 white onion
fresh cilantro
lime
There are all kinds of crazy ways people will tell you to use to determine if your pineapple is ripe, but basically it should have lots of yellow, and it should smell sweet. Reserve the rind when you slice up this pineapple if you want to make the pineapple juice that follows.
Cube some of the pineapple for the marinade, but remember to leave some thick slices intact so you can have them to grill later. 
Put the pineapple in a saucepan along with the water, vinegar, chiles, and salt. Simmer uncovered for about 10 minutes, or until the chiles are nice and soft. Please note that I used way more than a cup of pineapple. I don't measure. Whatever.
Once that's finished, pour the mixture into a blender and add the garlic and spices. If you're anything like me, for this next step you'll have to spend 10 minutes taking everything out of your spice cabinet to find what you need because you have the organizational skills of a chihuahua.
Once you've located the cloves, cumin and oregano, put them in the blender and resolve to organize at a later, as-yet-undetermined date.
Blend, and pour in a wide mixing bowl, or directly into whatever you plan to use to marinate the pork chops, and allow the mixture to cool to room temperature.
Also - key step - smell and taste. This stuff smells ridiculously good.
Idea: Add some fresh onion and cilantro to the blender and make yourself an awesome salsa for chips or whatever. If you do, let me know how that works for you.
Coat the pork chops with the mixture, place them in a dish and cover the container with plastic wrap. Marinate them for 6 - 24 hours. When you're ready to cook dinner, pre-heat your grill. You could use a grill pan or griddle if you want. Slice the onion into thick rounds, and skewer the rounds with grilling skewers to make your life easier. Please note from the picture that I forgot about the rounds and sliced my onion in half. Wrong move. Brush the onion and the pineapple with oil (canola or peanut for the grill - olive oil doesn't do well at high temperatures) and place on the upper rack of your grill. You could also do these in the oven using the broiler and a baking sheet.
Grill the pork about 1 minute per side. Once it's finished, slice it thinly for your tacos.
Did I want to take the pork chop bones into the bathroom and gnaw blissfully away in the bathtub? Yes. But I restrained myself.
Chop up your fixins.
Last step: Heat your tortillas. This is, in my opinion, a crucial step. Eating hot food out of a cold tortilla is terrible. This is not North Korea. You don't have to live your life like that. Very lightly brush the tortillas with oil. This will soften them up a little and give them some of that delicious char. Heat them directly on the stove or grill. Usually they will start to puff up in the middle when they are ready to flip.
Oh yes. Unfortunately I do not have a picture of the assembled taco. Too busy scarfing. Also unfortunate, I forgot to take pictures of the tomatillo sauce I made for these tacos. I promise you they're great without the sauce, but I'll put up pictures in the future.
I did enjoy my tacos with pineapple juice made from the rind of the pineapple. It's super easy, so here you go. Chop the rind into 1-2 inch chunks, and put it into a large pot along with:
4 c water
1/2 c cider vinegar
1/2 c turbinado or brown sugar
Boil it for about 20 minutes, then let the mixture cool to room temperature. If you have time, let it sit overnight to let the flavors groove on each other. Once it's cooled, move it to the blender and blend until the mixture is coarse. I had to do mine in batches. Once it's blended, pour it through a mesh strainer. Again, if you're a hobo like me, use your flour sifter. It works just fine. Mash down on the solids in the sifter to squeeze out as much of the juice as possible.
Taste the juice and decide if it needs more sugar or cider vinegar. Mine needed about 1/8 cup more sugar. Chill and serve over ice. Reserve about an inch at the top of your glass, and top it off with some club soda.
This would be really awesome with rum or tequila, but as I am currently living in a dark underworld of non-alcoholic beverages, this passes for a cocktail.
Cheers!
A
