Protein: 
Origin: Puerto Rico, Taste of the Islands
Method: Smoker or Oven
Jump to RecipePuerto Rico has quickly become one of our family's favorite Caribbean destinations. The food is fantastic and the people are friendly. Old San Juan is one of our favorite cities in all of the Caribbean with its old forts and Spanish architecture. We were excited to recently return to the Island of Enchantment as one of our first post-Covid vacations and it was just as enchanting as we remembered.
Pernil is a festive roast pork dish that is widely popular in Puerto Rico and in many countries across the Caribbean. Derived from the Spanish word pierna, meaning leg, pernil typically consists of slow roasted pork shoulder or ham. This succulent pork dish is marinated in flavorful seasoning, stuffed with garlic, and covered in sofrito. The pork is then slowly roasted for juicy perfection.
These days the dish is typically made from a whole or section of pork shoulder. Though you can make the dish with a Boston butt, we highly recommend using a skin on roast so you can also enjoy the crispy pork rind, or cuero. For this recipe we are using a skin on picnic roast and cooking the pernil on our smoker, to add a subtle smoky element to the dish.
Preparing the Smoked Pernil
To make this Puerto Rican Smoked Pernil recipe you will need:
- 1 8-10 Pound, Skin On Picnic Shoulder
- 10 Garlic Cloves, sliced
- ½ Cup Sofrito
- ¼ Cup Adobo Seasoning
- 2 Packets Sazon (Achiote style)
- 1-2 Tab Fresh or Dried Oregano
Trim the meat and marinade
Start with an 8-10 pound picnic roast. A picnic roast is the lower section of a pork shoulder, located below the Boston butt. It is traditionally cooked with the skin on.
If you can't find a picnic roast, pernil can be prepared with a pork butt or even a fresh ham.
Prepare your seasoning by combining the Adobo and Sazon. Both can now be found in many supermarkets, or will be available at most any Hispanic market
Prepare your garlic but peeling the garlic and slicing into slivers.
Carefully peal back the skin from the roast, while still leaving one end intact. Puncture the meat on all sides with a sharp knife and stuff the holes with slices of garlic.
Generously season the roast with the seasoning mix and then cover the meat with the sofrito. Sofrito is a sauce consisting of tomato, peppers, onion, garlic, and spices. You can make this from scratch, or it can typically be found in the Hispanic aisle of most supermarkets. Be sure to work the marinade into the holes with the garlic.
Sprinkle the meat with some dried, or better yet, fresh oregano.
Pull the skin back up over the meat and score the skin with a very sharp knife. You want the marinade under the skin, not on it. Try not to cut all of the way through to the pork.
Place the roast in a pan and cover with plastic wrap. Allow to marinate overnight in a refrigerator.
Cooking the Smoked Pernil
Remove the meat from the refrigerator and let it sit at room temperature while you set up the smoker. Make sure the pork skin is completely dry prior to cooking, to help it crisp up properly. Preheat your smoker to 325 degrees.
Cook the pernil with the skin toward your heat source for the first 2 hours.
After 2 hours, reduce your heat to 250 degrees and flip the pernil over so the skin is away from the heat source.
Continue to cook until the pork reaches an internal temperature of 185 degrees. This will typically take another 6-8 hours, but every piece of meat and smoker cooks differently so monitor the cook with a meat thermometer.
If the skin begins to get took dark you can spritz it with some apple juice, or cover the roast with foil to prevent further browning. If you cover with foil, you will want to uncover the meat at about 175 degrees so the skin can crisp back up.
Resting, slicing, and eating the Smoked Pernil
When your smoked pernil has reached 185 degrees, remove it from the smoker and cover with foil. Allow to rest for 15-20 minutes before slicing.
If your skin is not adequately crispy, or softened due to wrapping in foil, you can remove the skin before wrapping to rest. Increase the temperature of the smoker back to 300-325 degrees and place the skin facing the heat source. Cook for 5-20 minutes, to finish your skin to crispy perfection.
Slice the Smoked Pernil and serve while warm.
In Puerto Rico, Pernil is traditionally eaten with arroz con gandules (rice with pigeon peas). It also goes great with a side of charro beans.
Left over pernil is perfect for our Caribbean Roast Pork Sandwich or when used to make Grilled Cubanos.
The leftover meat can also be vacuum sealed and reheated later. By far the best way to reheat meat like brisket or pork and avoid drying it out is with a sous vide. You can read more about this useful kitchen tool on our Tools of the Trade page, or by clicking here.
If you are looking for more pork recipes, then be sure to check out our renditions of Eastern North Carolina Pulled Pork, Spanish Cochinillo Asado: Roast Suckling Pig, and Bacon Wrapped Pork Tenderloin.
📖 Recipe
Smoked Pernil
Equipment
- Smoker
Ingredients
- 1 8-10 Pound, Skin On Picnic Shoulder
- 10 Garlic Cloves sliced
- ½ Cup Sofrito
- ¼ Cup Adobo Seasoning
- 2 Packets Sazon (Achiote style)
- 1-2 Tab Fresh or Dried Oregano
Instructions
- Combine the Adobo and Sazon seasonings in a small bowl. Set aside.
- Trim access fat from the pork roast. Carefully peel back the skin using a sharp knife, but do not completely remove.
- Pierce the pork all over with the knife and insert the garlic slices into the pork.
- Cover all sides of the pork with the seasoning mixture, then cover with the sofrito.
- Sprinkle the pork with the oregano.
- Pull the skin back over the roast. With a sharp knife, carefully score the skin in a cross-hatch pattern. Try not to cut all of the way through the skin, into the pork.
- Pat the skin dry and cover the pork with plastic wrap. Allow the pork to marinate in the refrigerator overnight.
- When ready to cook, remove the pork from the refrigerator. Thoroughly dry the skin.
- Heat your grill or smoker to 325 degrees, set up for indirect heat. Place the pork, skin side down (or toward the heat source), and cook for 2 hours.
- After 2 hours, reduce the heat to 250 degrees. Flip the pork skin side up (or away from the heat source). Cook until the pork reaches an internal temperature of 185 degrees. This typically will take an additional 6-8 hours, but every piece of meat is different so monitor with a meat thermometer.
- Remove the meat from the smoker, cover with foil and rest for 15-20 minutes.
- Slice the meat and serve.
Notes
- If at any time the skin begins to look too dark, you can start spritzing with apple juice, or cover the roast with foil to prevent further browning. Covering with foil may cause a loss in the crispiness of the skin.
- If, at the completion of cooking, the skin is not adequately crispy you can remove it from the pork roast prior to resting the meat. Increase the heat of the grill to 300-325 degrees and cook the skin for 5-20 minutes to crisp it up.
Nutrition
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Kim
Made the Smoked Pernil Puerto Rican Roast Pork Shoulder this weekend.
It was AMAZING!! Curious what the nutritional info would be on the recipe but didn’t see it listed.
Carne Diem
So happy you enjoyed it. Sorry the recipe did not include the nutritional info. We plan on upgrading our recipe programing in the future so hopefully that information will be available before too long.
Miguel G.
Made this for my wife and Mother in law who is from Puerto Rico. They both said it reminded them of pernil they grew up with. I would say that is a success. Thanks, for sharing.
John
I'm going to give this recipe a try, but I'd like your opinion on smoking to a higher internal temp so that the pork pulls apart. Do you think that would be a bad idea?
Carne Diem
Traditionally pernil is served as a sliced roast pork. That said, pork shoulder makes for a great pulled pork so there is no reason that it shouldn't work. Just take it up to 200-205 internal. I have not tried this recipe that way so let me know how it turns out!
Ronald Hlinka
I tried this recipe but changed a couple of things based on what I had available. Actually I spritzed the roast with pineapple juice, apple juice and orange juice. Fantastic recipe overall! I liked cooking the fat cap down first at 325F, then flipping. I added residual marinade to top of soffrito, garlic
Carne Diem
Awesome, glad you liked it. The juice spritz sounds great!
Sean
One of our favorite roast pork recipes. Have made it several times now and was great every time.
Pete
So good!. made a homemade soffrito but otherwise followed the recipe. Turned out fantastic.