Carnitas

The Best Homemade Carnitas

One thing I think we can all agree with, we love tacos and this Carnitas recipe is no exception. If you don’t know what that means, I’m talking about tender yet crispy thin pieces of pork meat that have been cooked to perfection. Some of the busiest cities in Mexico and in the United States have street vendors cranking out these little gems like they’re going out of style. Folks can’t get enough and I’m going to show you how to do it better than any other online recipe.

Raw bone in pork shoulder roast with the skin.

Misconceptions about Carnitas

The very definition of the Latin word, “Carnitas” translates as braised or roasted pork served shredded in small pieces. Some people seem to think that means that the meat should be cut into small portions before cooking it. Nonsense. It’s the final product that needs to be chopped up. Some of the most famous cookeries in Mexico braise all of the meat in large portions. The only reason to cut the pork into small pieces would be to fit in your pot, if your home pot isn’t big enough. Also, you won’t be needing any additional lard to cook this recipe because this pork shoulder is marinated first, then baked and roasted in it’s own rendered fat.

Carnitas Marinade

As I already mentioned, Carnitas is braised or Roasted pork. In Mexico and most online recipes, the pork is cooked in large amounts of lard first, then all of the other ingredients are added half way through or more towards the end of the cooking. Marinating the meat first, then baking with the slow and low method, accomplishes several things; it flavors, tenderizes and allows you to free up your time instead of baby sitting the stove for several ours. If I want tacos for lunch, I get this started the night before and it cooks itself until I get up the next day. Not to mention, this process cooks the meat perfectly and I prove that in the video tutorial down below.

Fully Cooked Carnitas for tacos and burritos.

Carnitas Final Steps

This Carnitas recipe will roast for 12 hours in the oven but it’s not finished yet. Although you can achieve the tenderness from the slow and low method, you’re still going to want to add some more flavor and a bit of crispiness to the meat. This can be done by adding the final ingredients, orange juice, coca-cola, bay leaves and cranking the oven up several notch’s. After you add those ingredients you want to bake the pork with the lid off for another hour. Set the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit, cut spin and rotate the meat before and every half hour to reach its full potential. You’ll understand better, once you watch my tutorial.

If you’re interested in other taco recipes look into my Chipotle Chicken, Barbacoa, Street Tacos(Cabesa), Fish Tacos and my Taco Salad recipes. I’ve got two recipes for the Greek Tacos too; Pork Gyros and my American Greek Gyro recipe.

Carnitas Ingredients

10 lbs Pork Shoulder

1/4 cup Garlic Infused Oil
2 tsp Salt
1 tsp Black Pepper
1 tbsp Oregano
1 tbsp Cumin
2 tbsp Chipotle Pepper in Adobo Sauce
2 tbsp Sweetened condensed milk
1/2 tsp Ground Cloves

1/2 cup Orange Juice
1/2 cup Coca Cola
2 Bay Leaves
1 Onion

Bake at 200 degrees Fahrenheit for 12 hours. Cut pork into Pieces. Add Orange Juice, Cola and Bay Leaves to the rendered fat and cut pieces of meat. Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit, with the lid off for 30 minutes. Stir the mixture and bake for 30 more minutes, then remove from oven and shred.

Chile Verde – Pork Chile Verde Recipe

I really just can’t say enough about this Pork Chili Verde recipe. But first off, just know that you don’t have to add the pork if you’re just wanting the Chili Verde. This recipe is good to go either way and it’s as good as it gets. If you don’t know by now, I’m a man of my word and I don’t post recipes unless they are the best of the best. So be rest assured that this recipe, like the many before this one, is a winner.

You’re going to need a Good Green Enchilada Sauce to make this and I’ve included my recipe for that below, but you can always use a can if you’re feeling lazy or if you just don’t want it to taste amazing. Also know that you can control the heat by adding or taking away the Jalapeno in this recipe all together. But I feel like one pepper along with the Anaheim’s is a great balance of heat. Even my kids were eating this without complaints and I felt like it had plenty of kick. We ate it till it was gone. So give this a try and let me know what you think!

CLICK HERE for the Green Enchilada Sauce

CLICK HERE for my Chimichangas

Pork Chili Verde Ingredients:

2 1/2 lbs Carnitas(Pork), 1″ pieces
1 Onion, chopped
1 Anaheim Chili Pepper, chopped
Olive Oil for cooking
1 cup Vegetable Broth
season everything with Salt and Pepper

Enchilada Sauce
3 Anaheim Peppers
8 Tomatillo Tomatoes
2 Green Onions
1 Jalapeno (optional)
Chicken Broth, just enough to cover veggies
2 Garlic Cloves
1 tbsp Cumin
1 tsp Mexican Oregano
1/2 tsp Black Pepper

Follow the instructions in the short video tutorial and I’ll show you exactly how to make this Pork Chile Verde.

Barbecue Pork Medallion

This Barbecue Pork Medallion is Top Notch!

There’s a very good reason why Pork Medallions, or in this case, why my Barbecue Pork medallion is so tender. It’s a Pork Tenderloin. So unless you over cook or burn the meat, it’s virtually impossible to not have silver dollar sized slices that practically melt in your mouth. The secret to my recipe is just a 24 hour marinade. As far as the rest goes, there really isn’t much to it. In fact you don’t even have to use any special dressing or any cure for the meat. Just your favorite BBQ Sauce!

Now let’s talk about taking it to the oven. Again, there’s nothing to it, but the way I was first introduced to the Barbecue Pork Medallion, we were hanging 1 lbs portions with meat hooks that draped over skewers on the top rack shelf of a meat locker oven. A pan on the bottom caught all the drippings. It’s very common to cook ribs, thighs or poultry this way as well. However, given that most of us don’t have restaurant size ovens in our kitchens, any pan or oven safe dish will do just fine. After a 24 hour marinade in your favorite Barbecue sauce, 350 degrees in your oven, for an hour and a half, will get you right where you want to be when your slicing up your succulent Barbecue Pork Medallion. And coming from a 5 dollar Tenderloin and possibly a 98 cent bottle of Honey and Hickory Smoke BBQ Sauce, like I use from Kraft, how can you go wrong.

This is the way P.F. Chang’s makes their Pork Medallion, only they use their barbecue sauce, however. I have the recipe for that too.

CLICK HERE if you want P.F. Chang’s Barbecue Sauce Recipe

Barbecue Pork Medallion Ingredients:

1 Pork Tenderloin
1 cup Barbecue Sauce

Marinate Tenderloin in BBQ Sauce for 24 hours then bake at 350 degrees f for 1 1/2 hours.