Caribbean roast pork is a popular sandwich on several restaurant menus in Seattle, Washington. I recently visited and tried a really good one and a not-so-great one, and then came home to write about the experience and recreate the good one in my own kitchen.
What is this sandwich?
This is a sandwich that’s typically listed on menus as a Caribbean roast pork sandwich or sometimes just “Caribbean roast.” The roasted pork sandwich originated from what is now a small restaurant chain called Paseo and has spread to several other locations around the Seattle area. A few weeks ago I got a chance to try this sandwich and can report that it’s a great combination of flavors and textures.
On a recent ferry ride back to Seattle from Victoria, British Columbia, I also got a chance to try a concession stand-style version of the sandwich that was pre-prepped and tossed in a ferry galley toaster oven that’s clearly attempting to replicate the flavors and concept of the original. It’s not nearly as tasty as the sandwich it’s trying to replicate, but it was interesting to see it available. Yes, there are highs and lows in this Seattle sandwich adventure.
The first version of this Caribbean-style sandwich that appeared was found at a restaurant called Paseo in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle. Opened in 1994 by Lorenzo Lorenzo, a Cuban-born chef, Paseo served Caribbean sandwiches, including their now-famous Caribbean roast pork. Paseo proceeded to gain a lot of fans and popularity throughout the years, selling its Caribbean Roast sandwich, which contains “marinated and slow-roasted pork shoulder, fresh cilantro, pickled jalapenos, caramelized onions, and crisp romaine on a toasted baguette slathered with garlic aioli.”
Several well-known professional food writers and content creators have even gone so far as to say that this style of sandwich might not just be the best sandwich in Seattle, but it might warrant a spot on best-of lists across America. In 2008—before all the restaurant drama—Esquire magazine ranked Paseo’s pork sandwich as one of the best in the Country.
Paseo and Un Bien
Paseo ended up having some trouble 20 years after they first opened, which ended up with a lawsuit that snowballed into bankruptcy and finally closure in 2014. There’s a lot of information about Paseo and the drama surrounding these events on Wikipedia, but the gist is that someone else ended up buying Lorenzo Lorenzo’s Paseo naming rights and locations, but they did not get the official recipes. The new owners of Paseo did rehire some of the old staff, and they have attempted to recreate the recipes through reverse engineering and have ended up being fairly successful and have opened other locations around the Seattle area.
Soon after Paseo was purchased and reopened under another ownership group, Lorenzo Lorenzo’s sons opened their own Caribbean sandwich-serving location called Un Bien with the original recipes from Paseo. Basically, this meant that both Paseo and Un Bien were—and still are—serving a sandwich that’s nearly identical to the other version. Both locations are still quite popular in 2026, and they’re so similar in focus that they source their baguettes from the same local bakery.
It should also be noted that these two restaurants, Paseo and Un Bien, are practically neighbors, occupying locations that are fairly close together or even in the same neighborhoods, and at this point they both have large fan bases that have their own favorites between the two options.
Which sandwich is best? That’s an answer that someone else will have to teach you, because I only tried the sandwich from the location closest to our lodging. But you can check out these two videos from two sources that I trust very much.
I did try the Un Bien sandwich, and I have covered my experience eating that one just below.
As I said, I recently visited Seattle, and I had the chance to visit Un Bien and pick up one of their Caribbean Roast sandwiches to go. The pork was tender and juicy, which mixed in a really good way with the garlicky mayonnaise. The bread was just a little bit crusty on the exterior, and that created a great textural experience with the soft and tender pork and onions.
The caramelized onions brought a bunch of sweetness that really seemed to accentuate the citrusy flavors in the pork. There was a bit of spice from the pickled jalapenos, but any heat was heavily muted by the bread and meat. It was not a very spicy sandwich, so if that worries you, you should be able to handle it just fine.
Un Bien’s Caribbean roast pork sandwich is really good. I will definitely give Paseo’s version a shot on my next visit to Seattle, but for now, I know I can make my own version that is just as good as Un Bien’s. You can too if you grab my full recipe below. But for now, keep reading about other versions of the sandwich and a full dive into each sandwich component.
Un Bien and Paseo aren’t the only sandwich shops slinging Caribbean-style pork sandwiches in Seattle. I did not get a chance to try any of these other versions, but Bongo’s Cafe has what they call The Desi Sandwich, which is very similar to the original Caribbean pork sandwich. Also, a restaurant called Honeyhole sells a Mojo Dojo (pictured here) that has components that are similar to the Paseo and Un Bien version.
But that’s not the only place you might find a Caribbean pork sandwich in the Seattle area.
Victoria Clipper ferry’s Caribbean roast pork
We took the 3-hour Victoria Clipper ferry from Seattle to Victoria, British Columbia, and back, to get a taste of poutine, look at moose, and see what milk in bags looks like, and on that trip I happened to open up the galley menu and saw a Caribbean roast pork sandwich. On the way to Victoria, it was fairly early in the morning, so I didn’t try the sandwich then, but I did order it and ate it on the trip back.
It was fine. It was basically an airport-style sandwich where most of the ingredients were probably pre-made in a kitchen and trucked over to the boat. This version of the roast pork sandwich did not have lettuce, which meant that the whole thing could probably be premade and warmed when ordered. They gave me the option of a warm sandwich, which meant it went into a toaster to heat and crisp up.
The bread was a bit too soft; there wasn’t really enough of any one ingredient, but I certainly ate the whole thing. It was a fine enough sandwich; it just felt like fast food that was prepared by someone who didn’t really care how balanced the ingredients were on the sandwich.
I was mostly surprised at how this sandwich is such a well-known Seattle staple that it’s even included in the simple sandwich menu on at least one nearby ferry. Would I suggest this Victoria Clipper roast pork sandwich? Well, it depends. Are you stuck on a boat for 3+ hours with no other food options? Yes, in that case I would suggest it over the likely soggy chicken Caesar wrap or berry yogurt parfait. But don’t get your hopes up too high.
Now that we know what sandwich we’re making, let’s start with the most complicated part, which is the bread.
Homemade baguettes
Baguettes are not a recipe that I suggest beginning bakers attempt first. They’re not super difficult or anything; there are simply steps that are needed to produce a quality of bread that is anywhere close to what they make in a professional bakery.
I spent a good deal of time writing about baguettes and how I make them in my Jambon-beurre sandwich blog post that you should read up on if you’ve never tried baking baguettes and you’re interested. I do not consider myself to be great at making baguettes, but I do have some practice at this point, and the ones that I can regularly produce in my kitchen suit a sandwich like this Caribbean pork sandwich pretty well.
Baking your own baguettes is a bit harder than making things like white bread and hamburger buns, but it’s rewarding when you end up with a crusty piece of bread that will hold up well to tender, juicy pork and caramelized onions.
They’re also great with ham and butter too!
Here’s my homemade baguette recipe that you can try if you want to make this sandwich. Otherwise, you simply need to buy baguettes, or if you can’t find those, just look for a crusty bread roll that will stand up to the soft, tender, and juicy pork and caramelized onions.
French-style baguettes
A crispy, crusted bread roll that is still soft and chewy in the middle. Perfect for a sub-style sandwich where you need big bread crunch or even sliced thinly and served toasted with olive oil alongside meat and cheese on a charcuterie board.
Get RecipeMojo slow cooker pork
I already have a slow-roasted Mojo pork recipe that would be much closer to the cooking process that they’re using at Paseo and Un Bien in terms of an oven-cooked citrusy pork recipe. Because of this, and because it’s still the hot days of summer, I decided to turn that recipe and marinade into a recipe that I could cook in a slow cooker or crockpot, and it turned out pretty well.
Like most slow cooker recipes, everything goes into the crockpot and cooks for a long time. I cooked mine for 7 to 8 hours on low, but you can also achieve a similar consistency by cooking 4 to 5 hours on high.
This pork is heavy on the citrus flavors that come from lime juice, orange juice, orange zest, and mango nectar. If you can’t find mango nectar, you could use more orange juice or even water, but it’ll just be a bit less citrusy. Fresh parsley, oregano, and lots of garlic round out the rest of the recipe ingredients, which give the finished pork a garlicky and fruity flavor that comes through in the finished sandwich.
Note: The oven-roasted mojo pork recipe does not contain mango nectar because I haven’t had a chance to test it with that yet. But since it’s a marinade, it should work if you want to add some.
Once the meat has fully cooked, allow it to rest for about 15 minutes or until it’s cool enough to handle. Remove the meat to a cutting board or maybe even a sheet pan with a lip to catch any juices. Remove the large bone and any large chunks of fat. If you look up and see that whole fatty left side in the first photo? Most of the fat will not render, and you can pull it off at the end because the fat might add a weird texture you might not enjoy in the sandwich.
Once the fat and bone are removed, pull the meat into smaller bite-sized pieces. Then you can move the meat to a large sealed container, and don’t discard all the residual juices from the slow cooker. Spoon some of that over the pork and then place everything in the fridge until it’s time to sandwich.
As I said above, this is the slow cooker version of my mojo pork. I also have the oven-roasted recipe linked above, and instructions for the one you put in the oven are in the full sandwich recipe at the bottom of this sandwich blog post. Feel free to use the slow cooker recipe if you don’t want to heat up your kitchen. The result of the mojo pork will be pretty close to the same with either recipe.
Mojo slow cooker pork
This citrusy, garlicky, and tender pork is easy to put together and works great in a sandwich. You can use this as the main meat for your next Cuban or Caribbean roast pork sandwich.
Get RecipeGarlic mayonnaise
The garlic aioli or mayonnaise is actually a pretty large component in the Un Bien sandwich, so I think it’s pretty important to replicate it in your at-home versions. Don’t just use plain mayonnaise.
Originally, the word aioli stood for a garlic and oil emulsion that included no mayonnaise. This meant that garlic, salt, and lemon juice were blended into a paste and then oil was drizzled in while whisking until you basically had a spread with the consistency of mayonnaise.
At some point in the last 30 or so years, someone started using the word aioli to mean “fancy mayonnaise.” The spread used in the Paseo and Un Bien sandwiches may say “garlic aioli,” but it really means a garlic mayonnaise.
I do not include this recipe in the full sandwich recipe down below, but I link to it from the ingredients. I think it’s pretty important to make sure you use it because it contributes a lot of flavor to the final sandwich.
Simple garlic mayonnaise
This simple sauce will elevate your next sandwich. Or you can use it as a great garlic-focused dip for French fries or potato chips.
Get RecipePickled jalapenos
You can buy pickled jalapenos, or you can use my recipe below. I made a batch a few weeks ago and used those. But if you’re afraid of spice, you should be able to find mild varieties of pickled jalapenos at the store. Those will still add a little bit of spice to the sandwich without overwhelming things with heat.
Believe me, there’s enough going on in the sandwich with the meat, onions, garlicky mayonnaise, and bread that will balance out the peppers so that they do not take over the flavors. If you do decide to leave out the jalapenos, maybe you should try some dill pickle slices instead, which will still contribute some acid to contrast the fattiness of the pork and mayonnaise.
Pickled MSG jalapenos
Need a spicy kick with a bit of crunchy texture in your next sandwich? They're also perfect to spice up your next nacho or taco night.
Get RecipeCaramelized onions
The sweetness that the onions bring to the sandwich makes them a pretty integral part of the whole flavor experience. I have a recipe below for caramelizing onions, but I also put this into the full sandwich recipe below.
Caramelizing onions is a fairly easy process; it just takes quite a bit of hands-on time. You should expect to be in the kitchen stirring every couple of minutes for at least 45 minutes. For this sandwich, I cooked mine to be a fairly light shade of brown. You can go longer if you’d like your onions to be darker, but since I started with Vidalia onions, which are already fairly sweet, I didn’t feel I needed to go too intensely dark.
Here’s my caramelized onion recipe. As I said above, I also put it into the full sandwich recipe below.
Caramelized onions
Caramelized onions are a great refrigerator staple when it's time to make flavor combinations. Sweetness and texture additions will complement the savory elements you might already have in your sandwich.
Get RecipeOh, and also Romaine lettuce
I sliced my romaine into smaller pieces, but I have seen in some videos and official photos that both Un Bien and Paseo will use much larger leaves. I don’t think this really matters much in the experience of eating the sandwich, but if you want to be fully authentic, you might want to use larger Romaine leaves.
Just make sure you’re sourcing your Romaine lettuce from a place that isn’t Taylor Farms. Good luck!
Caribbean roast pork sandwich photos and recipe
Here’s a bunch of photos that I took during the creation of this sandwich and recipe. The mojo pork in either the oven-roasted version or the slow cooker version will make a bunch of meat, so I ate this sandwich quite a few times.
Scroll through the photos to get to the full recipe and let me know in the comments or on social media if you give it a try.
Caribbean roast pork sandwich
This roasted pork sandwich is inspired by the sandwiches you'll find on the menu at Seattle's Paseo and Un Bien restaurants. Slow-cooked, tender, and citrusy pork is joined by sweet caramelized onion, garlicky mayonnaise, and a little kick of pickled jalapeno spice. Now you can travel to the Caribbean via Seattle in your own kitchen.
Ingredients:
Mojo roast pork- 4 to 6 pound pork roast or shoulder
- 12 cloves minced garlic (around 1 head of garlic)
- 1⁄4 cup olive oil
- 3 tablespoons lime juice
- 3 tablespoons orange juice
- 1 tablespoon orange zest
- 3 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
- 1 tablespoon kosher salt
- 2 teaspoons ground cumin
- 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- 2 tablespoons butter
- 2 to 3 large yellow onion or Vidalia onions, thinly sliced
- a pinch or more of kosher salt
- water
- 1 baguette, sliced into about a 7 or 8 inch piece
- 2 to 3 tablespoons garlic mayonnaise (link to recipe)
- 6 to 10 pickled jalapeno slices
- 10 or so leaves of cilantro
- Mojo roast pork (from above)
- caramelized onions (from above)
- 1 to 2 Romaine leaves, chopped up however you'd like
Directions:
Mojo roast pork: place pork in a container with a lid or a zip-top bag that will hold it.
Combine all other ingredients in a bowl and stir to integrate, creating the mojo marinade. Add 2/3rds of the marinade into the container/bag with the pork and massage to spread it all around.
Refrigerate for 4 hours or overnight for best results.
Preheat oven to 275 degrees.
Remove pork from the container with the marinade and wrap it loosely with a double layer of aluminum foil. It's important to keep the foil loose at this point to let air circulate inside the foil package around the meat.
Bake on a baking sheet for 2 hours.
Open the top of the foil, exposing the top of the pork, and raise the oven temperature to 325 F and bake for another 2 hours. If you want, during these last 2 hours, you can pull the pork out and baste it with the accumulated juices in the pan/foil.
Once the 2 hours are up, remove the pork from the oven and allow it to rest for 15 minutes. And then, using two forks or your hands, shred the pork into smaller bite-sized pieces. Add the pieces to a container with some of the liquid left in the bottom of the aluminum foil/pan, then pour over the last 1/3 of the marinade and mix the pork in with the marinade and accumulated liquid to combine it all. Store the meat and juices in the fridge in a sealed container for up to a few days. Warming the meat briefly in a pan on the stove or in the microwave before using it in a sandwich.
Caramelized onions: add 2 tablespoons of butter to a large pan over medium heat.
When the butter is bubbly and frothing, add all of your sliced onions. Add a pinch of salt and stir everything to combine.
Reduce the heat to medium-low and cook the onions, stirring often, for 20 minutes.
After 20 minutes, your onions should be starting to become lightly tan-colored, but not browned. You might start to see dark brown spots forming on the bottom of the pan, though, and if you do see that, add a tablespoon or two of water to the pan with the onions and use that water to stir the dark parts at the bottom to keep things from burning.
Continue cooking the onions over medium-low heat for another 15 to 25 minutes. Remember: if you see dark spots or dry areas on the pan, add a tablespoon or two of water. The water should cook off quickly, but it will help to temper the pan temperature and help the onions cook through without burning.
After the onions are nice and turning brown, remove from the pan to a sealed container, and if not serving immediately, store in the fridge for no more than a week or so.
Sandwich assembly: slice a baguette about 7 to 8 inches long and split it in half lengthwise. Toast it lightly.
Spread some garlic mayonnaise on both sides of the bread. Top the bottom slice with pickled jalapeno slices and cilantro.
Warm the pork and a pile of onions either in a pan, in the oven, or in the microwave (as mentioned above). Add as much pork as you'd like on top of the jalapeno slices and cilantro. Then layer the onions on top of the pork.
Add Romaine lettuce and close the sandwich to complete. Serve and enjoy.
Check back next week
I’ll be making a loose meat and spice-focused sandwich that’s packed with all sorts of meat and cheese. Or at least that’s what I’m planning—I haven’t started yet… That sounds like a tasty sandwich adventure to me. Subscribe and get notified by electronic mail when I post about it.
Multi-Level Markkanen says:
I used to live near the original Un Bien and I could smell the onions cooking in the morning as I drove by. A classic.
Jonathan Surratt says:
Ahh, that would be good and bad depending on how hungry you were… 😂
diana forsthoffer says:
no mango nectar in the oven-baked version?