Sour Orange Braised Collards

📝 Notes: Also known as: Cracker Collards · Miz Kathi's Sour Orange Greens The concept: Classic: pot likker collards. Vectors: Substitution (sour orange juice replaces the cider vinegar finish) + Terroir swap (Florida sour orange, a Cracker-era dooryard citrus, instead of a generic acid). The fruit's bitterness plays against the pork fat rather than just cutting it. Hero ingredient: Fresh sour orange juice, finished off heat so the aromatic oil in the peel doesn't cook off. Plating: Serve in a bowl with pot likker, cornbread on the side for dunking. Zest curl on top for color. Pro upgrade: render a bit of the sour orange peel oil into the pork stock at the start for a rounder aromatic instead of relying only on the finish. Prep efficiency: braises 3 hours hands-off; cook the day before and reheat — greens improve overnight. Cross-utilization: same pork stock and pulled pork feed Butter Beans and Mr. Jimmy's Butter Bean Soup — no new protein SKU. Failure modes: adding acid too early turns the greens gray-green and dulls the citrus aromatics; always finish off heat. Scaling: At 4x: pot likker reduces slower relative to volume — check liquid level at hour 2, may need to top with stock. At 10x: batch braise in two pots; a single pot this size scorches on the bottom before the top layer is tender.