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The Complete Cafe Rio Sweet Pork Salad Copycat Recipe, right at your fingertips! So easy to make at home, and tastes exactly like the popular restaurant version.
Featured with this Recipe
- Cafe Rio Sweet Pork Salad
- Ingredients in a Sweet Pork Salad
- What is the Difference Between the Creamy Tomatillo Dressing and the Cilantro Lime Dressing?
- Frequently Asked Questions
- How to Make the Sweet Pork
- More Cafe Rio Recipes
- How to Make Cafe Rio’s Sweet Pork Salad
- Cafe Rio Sweet Pork Salad Copycat Recipe
Cafe Rio Sweet Pork Salad
Thank you to all you die hard Cafe Rio and Costa Vida fans for making us the number one site for Cafe Rio copycat recipes! If you haven’t tried this easy recipe for the famous Sweet Pork Salad yet, you are in for a treat! We LOVE Cafe Rio and Costa Vida – and we’re very picky about our Cafe Rio sweet pork.
This recipe tastes exactly like the restaurant version, but so easy because you can make it right at home! We also played around with the rice, the beans, and the house ranch dressing. Finally, we nailed it! This recipe tastes exactly like having Cafe Rio take-out. You can even use a lot of these ingredients to try and imitate Cafe Rio’s tacos, quesadillas, enchiladas, or nachos. Try it for yourself and you will see what we mean! Be sure to check out all our other tasty Mexican Recipes! We have all kinds of yummy Mexican dishes to round out your meals and celebrations!
Ingredients in a Sweet Pork Salad
This recipe has a lot of ingredients and a lot of separate recipes within the recipe. Don’t be intimidated! If you are wanting to simplify, you can just make the sweet pork and the dressing and get everything else store-bought. You can also make the beans, rice, pork, and dressing all a day or two before hand to make assembly quicker.
- flour tortilla < click the link for our homemade recipe
- shredded cheese (Mexican blend)
- cilantro lime rice < click the link for our homemade recipe
- black beans < click the link for our homemade recipe
- Cafe Rio sweet pork < click the link for our homemade recipe
- leafy green or Romaine lettuce (not iceberg)
- pico de gallo < click the link for our homemade recipe
- guacamole < click the link for our homemade recipe
- tortilla strips < click the link for our homemade recipe
- Cotija cheese (crumbled)
- fresh cilantro (they usually do sprigs but I like fresh chopped cilantro)
Cafe Rio’s Dressings
- creamy tomatillo ranch dressing < click the link for our homemade recipe (aka cilantro ranch dressing)
- OR cilantro lime dressing < click the link for our homemade recipe
Ingredient Variations
If you have some picky eaters who don’t like guac or pico de gallo but don’t want the salad too plain or want to try some different ingredients to make your salad your own; here are some great options that will compliment your salad.
- green chilies
- onions
- lime juice
- refried beans
- sliced avocado
What is the Difference Between the Creamy Tomatillo Dressing and the Cilantro Lime Dressing?
We love both of these dressings so much – it is always hard to choose! They are both made with tomatillos, cilantro, and lime so the basic flavor is the same. The difference is that the Ranch Dressing is thick and creamy like a traditional ranch dressing. The Cilantro Lime Dressing is more of a vinaigrette. It really just comes down to preference!
Frequently Asked Questions
The tins Cafe Rio uses are 9″ round disposable foil pans. You can find them at most restaurant supply stores or on Amazon: Disposable Foil Pans (just like what Cafe Rio uses)
The recipe below is the proportions for one salad. However, if you make up all the recipes (rice, beans, pork, etc.) it can make 4-6 salads, depending on how hungry people are.
When you are ordering your salad at Cafe Rio, you have several different options as far as the meat goes. Not just pork. You can get it with grilled chicken, shredded chicken, shredded beef, or steak. Any of these work well with the salad!
As far as preparing the chicken the same way as the pork, I wouldn’t recommend it. They are two totally different types of meat and it really won’t taste the same. If you are going to use chicken, my favorite way is grilled and sliced.
How to Make the Sweet Pork
Read Next: Easy Dinner Ideas
More Cafe Rio Recipes
We have some of the best recipe copycats of our favorite menu items at Cafe Rio. You will want to try them all!
- Our Version of Cafe Rio’s Chicken Tortilla Soup
- Salsa Fresca (Pico de Gallo)
- Our Version of Cafe Rio’s Cilantro-Lime Vinaigrette
- Our Version of Cafe Rio’s Sweet Pork Burrito
- Homemade Flour Tortillas
- Homemade Tortilla Strips
- The BEST Guacamole EVER
How to Make Cafe Rio’s Sweet Pork Salad
Cafe Rio Sweet Pork Salad Copycat
Ingredients
- 1 large flour tortilla < click the link for our homemade recipe
- 1/3 cup shredded cheese (Mexican blend)
- 1/3 cup cilantro lime rice < click the link for our homemade recipe
- 1/3 cup black beans < click the link for our homemade recipe
- 1/2 cup Cafe Rio sweet pork < click the link for our homemade recipe
- 2 cups leafy green or Romaine lettuce (not iceberg)
- 1/4 cup pico de gallo < click the link for our homemade recipe
- 1/4 cup guacamole < click the link for our homemade recipe
- 1/4 cup tortilla strips < click the link for our homemade recipe
- 1 tablespoon Cotija cheese (crumbled)
- 1/4 cup creamy tomatillo ranch dressing < click the link for our homemade recipe
- OR cilantro lime dressing < click the link for our homemade recipe
Instructions
- Lay a tortilla in the bottom of an aluminum tin, a bowl, or plate. Sprinkle cheese on it, and put in the oven at 375 for about 5 min or until the cheese is melted.
- Remove from oven and add rice, beans, and pork.
- Next add the lettuce. Top with pico de gallo, guacamole, tortilla strips, cilantro, and Cotija cheese.
- Serve with the cilantro ranch or vinaigrette dressing and enjoy!
Notes
Recipe Tips:
- Get 9″ round Disposable Foil Pans for your burritos for the full restaurant effect:(just like what Cafe Rio uses)
- The Ranch Dressing is thick and creamy like a traditional ranch dressing.
- The Cilantro Lime Dressing is more of a vinaigrette dressing.
- If you are wanting to use a different dressing I would recommend a chipotle ranch or a balsamic vinaigrette.
- The recipe below is the proportions for one salad. However, if you make up all the recipes (rice, beans, pork, etc.) it can make 4-6 salads, depending on how hungry people are.
- We prefer to store the leftovers in separate airtight containers in the fridge. Leftover sweet pork can also be stored in the freezer, thaw in the refrigerator when ready to use.
Nutrition Information
This post contains links to Amazon.com. Please note that Amazon prices tend to change often so prices may be higher or lower without notice.
I live in Alabama after being raised in Utah. I’ve made this twice for my boyfriend and his brother. They love it and if reminds me of home. Great copy cat recipe.
Thank you for letting us know! Here is the link: https://www.favfamilyrecipes.com/cafe-rio-sweet-pork/
I just wanted to let you know that I’ve made this recipe a bunch now and love it EVERY time! I’m always sad when it’s gone. Guests love it, my family loves it, it’s a crowd fave. It admittedly takes me all day to prepare with all the parts to fix with fresh ingredients, but it’s worth it. Thank you for sharing!
Thanks so much! Glad you love this recipe as much as we do 😀
We love Café Rio. I made the pork but used a pork tenderloin. The flavor was good but it definitely wasn’t Café Rio. We did not like the red enchilada sauce flavor. I don’t think Café Rio’s has that in it. Next time I might use green sauce. Thanks for the recipes.
So I just made everyone of these recipes besides the tortillas and they were all pretty good. Here’s what I was a little disappointed with. First the rice. It really needed salt. The beans with tomato juice? It was not good. I just drained the beans but didn’t rinse them and added some garlic, cumin, lime, and cilantro like the recipe said and then a sprinkle of sugar. It was a lot more like costa vida or cafe rio that way. Everything else was pretty delicious. Expect the pork. It was soooo bland! And It is not easy by the way. With all the marinading and draining and work you have to do, I was expecting some amazing pork but it was really disappointing. It was definitely missing something. Save yourself time, don’t bother marinading the pork, just put a half a can of coke, a half can of green chiles (I like putting the chiles in a food processer before I add them to the crock pot), a half can of red encilauda sauce, 3/4 cup of brown sugar, a 1/3 cup of soy sauce, a 1/4 a tsp. of garlic salt, stir it together in the crock pot then throw some pork in! Cook on low for 8 hours and bam. You got youself delicious sweet pork without all the work. The ranch recipe was great. The vinaigrette needs some fixing. Other than that everything was pretty good.
Thank you, we LOVE, LOVE, LOVE These recipes, so easy to follow and taste beyond fantastic! I’m getting ready to make all of these recipes again to take to our family reunion, where I know they will be a huge success! Thank you for creating them for all of us!!!
Erica, How many people do these recipes (the beans, rice, pork, etc) serve as written? I need to increase it to feed 40. Thanks so much. It’s going to be a huge hit at a women’s retreat I’m going to in June.
The beans and rice should should serve about 4-6… the pork might be closer to 6-8 if you use a full 2 pounds of pork. Hope this helps! – Erica
Fabulous recipes! Loved it! My family loves it. I think my daughter could drink the cilantro lime ranch dressing! Thank you so much for sharing your recipes!
haha I am totally with your daughter! That ranch is my favorite! Thanks for the nice comment!
I’ve heard that if you use roasted garlic to use Dr. Pepper. Regular garlic, Coke. I haven’t tried it yet, but since I like roasted garlic I might use Dr. Pepper.
We liked this so much over at Copycat Crafts that we featured it recently! You can view it here
http://www.copycatcrafts.com/cafe-rio-sweet-pork-salad-copycat/
We’d love it if you’d like to display a featured button! You can grab your button on the right hand side of your post. Thanks!
Thanks for the link-back!
Unbelievable likeness of the original. I’ve been told that Dr. Pepper was the correct soda ingredient and I’ve seen root beer used. Coke is the only way to go! Fantastic job replicating this recipe. We doubled the rice and beans and quadroupled the meat. It took two days to create this meal (initial croc cook on day one and two-hour cook on day two) but was well worth the effort. Thank you so much for sharing this.
I am making this receipe tonight in Adelaide, Australia and can’t wait to eat it with my family. Just wondering if I can substitute canned tomatillos for fresh, as we don’t eat them here and have to get them imported
Fresh will work fine! Yay, it’s exciting for us to hear about people reading our blog from other countries!