That last rule is good news for pastor fans: A seasoned taquero would never slice into raw meat - and a well-maintained trompo, as the pastor cone is called, will always have a thick layer that is above the 155 degrees required for beef and pork (chicken, as shawarma is sometimes made with, must hit 165). As long as the meat being sliced is completely cooked, no further time on the griddle or pan is needed, but any slices that are undercooked must be further cooked, and undercooked slices can’t be stored and reused with cooked slices. “Once they place the cone, it has to remain on the roaster and be continuously rotating.” And after the meat is shaved off the cone, it must be held at 135 degrees or above, or chilled to 41 degrees or below relatively quickly (within six hours). “It has to do with time control as well as temperature control,” explains Grace Nelson, a supervisor in the food program for the Public Health Inspections division. (That extra step was bemoaned by pastor purists, who claimed that the additional cooking dried out the meat and muddled the roasted flavor gained by the traditional method.)īut a couple of years ago, the DEH devised a new set of regulations that had the potential to kill off vertical roasting in many kitchens around town. With vertical broilers, as the Denver Department of Environmental Health designates the equipment used for pastor and gyros, previous rules stipulated that the meat had to be roasted and then finished on a griddle or hot pan to ensure that it was served at a safe temperature. With pastor and similar spit-roasted meats, what once worked on the busy streets of the city where a dish originated may not meet current safety practices in another city. While most restaurant owners and cooks understand that meat held between 41 and 135 degrees Fahrenheit for very long will probably result in contaminated product, the need to sell food sometimes outweighs stringent adherence to food-handling guidelines. But in some settings - say, a restaurant with many other items on the menu or a taqueria that does a brisk business on Saturday nights but is almost empty during weekday lunch - a twenty-pound tower of raw meat sitting at room temperature for hours doesn’t conform to our modern notions of food safety (based on scientific evidence, not mere squeamishness). The process relies on a steady stream of customers so that as the raw meat at the center of the cone cooks, the meat on the outer layers is shaved away, never sitting too long, thus guaranteeing a safe and healthy meal.
Similar beef and lamb rigs employ the same cooking method in food stalls along the Mediterranean, where the meat is called gyros, doner or shawarma, depending on the country you’re in. A couple more quick swipes of the knife add a shower of pineapple - and your taco is ready.Īt least, that’s the way it’s worked for generations of taco stands in Mexico City and other towns where tacos al pastor are popular. Then, when the outer layer is perfectly crisp and sizzling, the taquero brandishes a machete-sized knife and carves thin shavings of pork that fall into a tortilla waiting in his other hand. A vertical cone of marinated pork - usually shoulder sliced thin and stacked on a skewer - spins slowly in front of a red-hot burner a pineapple or an onion (or sometimes a chunk of pork fat) skewered at the top weeps tears of joy that streak the cone with a mahogany patina as the juices caramelize. For meat lovers, carne al pastor is an object of beauty.
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