Cooking with Avocado

My good friend Clare was so sad that the 10 Days in Dominica challenge ended that she came up with her own challenge. In the Caribbean Kitchen Cooking & Blogging Challenge, we are supposed to use one local vegetable a week for the next 6 weeks to create an island inspired recipe.  

This week the special ingredient is avocados. As a Californian and Mexican food enthusiast, I already have a good handle on how to cook with avocados. This week I'm going to share my easy guacamole recipe with you along with the recipe for the carnitas that I served it with.

Start with the garlic, jalepenos and onion.  

In the land of plenty America there would be cilantro.

Cut your avocado in half, lengthwise.

Then use a spoon to make hash marks through the fruit to the skin.  

Finally, use the spoon to scoop out all the goodness!

Add some salt and lime juice.

Mix carefully, so it ends up chunky!

Now, on to what I made to go with this: Carnitas. I adapted what I made from a recipe I found here. Basically, I rubbed boneless pork chops down with salt, pepper, cumin, and chile powder. Then I grilled them lightly in olive oil with loads of garlic and onion inside a big metal pot. I added lots of lime and lemon juice and enough water to cover the meat and let it cook until all the water was gone (about 2 hours). I let them keep cooking until they were nice and browned.

Once the pieces of pork sit for a few minutes they should shred easily.

Serve the carnitas with cheese, sour cream, taco sauce, and of course guacamole!