I have a longtime friend of a certain fleshy girth who, one Saturday morning, stood outside the window of Pilsen’s great Carnitas Don Pedro, in front of its famous mountain of steaming, glistening porky goodness, and thoughtfully observed, “This is what I look like when I get out of the shower.”
Earlier this summer I was introduced to jackfruit “carnitas” at Mini Mott, and the less said about those the better. But balance was restored to the universe when friend of the Food Chain Kristina Meyer clued me in to the delights within Carnitas la Esquinita, where 29-year-old chef Oscar Hernandez makes extraordinary carnitas during the day shift before he heads north to his second gig in the kitchen at Khan BBQ (from which no pork has ever come).
Maybe if Hernandez made a mountain of little meats in the window, Carnitas La Esquinita would be spoken of in the same breath as the big three—or maybe they would just suffer from exposure. Hiding in plain sight certainly hasn’t hurt their source. v
3424 W. Irving Park 773-588-1649 laesquinitatogo.com
