Pork Carnitas

If you've been to Chipotle (or any actual Mexican restaurants), you may have come across a mean pork dish called 'carnitas', which really just means "little meats" in Spanish.  Made famous in the Michoacán region of Mexico, large hunks of seasoned pork are cooked for a very long time in either broth (braised) or fat (rendered in lard, essentially) before plating with tortillas, lime, and cilantro.  I didn't quite feel like cooking an already fatty pork shoulder in lard for many hours, so I went looking for a broth recipe, and merged a number of them to create what I thought was a very flavorful but simple finished product.  Rather than deep frying to get the right kind of crisp exterior and moist interior, I created a two-step method of braising followed by quick browning in the oven, with enough liquid to prevent it from getting dry.  I've made this dish a dozen times, and it's a consistently easy hit among company.

First of all, this dish is greatly facilitated by a pressure cooker.  If you don't have one, a slow cooker might do the trick.  If you don't have that, maybe just a heavy pot.  And if you don't have one of those, you probably shouldn't be on this site.  To make this, I use picnic shoulder, but I've also used Boston Butt.  Either one is great, as it will have the right amount of fat to add to the very lean cooking method.  Don't get all crazy on me and put in a pork loin, or you will miss out on the flavor imparted by the fat which, if you do this right, is mostly cooked out in the process of slow braising.  An explanation is in the directions.

Pork carnitas, served simply with corn tortillas and black beans

Shredded Pork (Carnitas)

• 2 16 oz cans of chicken broth
• 1 lime, juiced, zest shaved first with zester or removed in large strips with a vegetable peeler
• 1 large scallion, cut into 3 pieces
• 3 garlic cloves
• 4 pounds of boneless pork shoulder
• 1 tbsp chopped coriander (cilantro)
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 tbsp cumin
• Corn Tortillas
• Chili sauce, such as Pico de gallo, chipotle or whatever you like

The setup.  It's a very short list, not hard to gather

Cut the pork meat in chunks and discard big pieces of fat, but leave some fat as it adds to the flavor.  Set a large pot or pressure cooker over mid-high heat.  Add the pork, garlic, lime zest, bay leaves, cilantro, cumin, green onion, juice from the lime, and broth.  I like to zest the whole lime into the pot and then just cut it in half and squeeze the mangled fruit juice right in there, making for easy cleanup.  If you prefer more tartness, add more citrus to your braising liquid.  Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low and simmer for about 3-4 hours or until the meat is very soft and pulls apart easily, or 1 hour for the pressure cooker.

Before simmering.  This is a really easy dish to get started, just throw everything in there and close it up.  Takes 5 minutes or less.

After simmering.  This meat is now incredibly tender and falling apart, so remove carefully

20 minutes before the stovetop portion is done, preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.  Remove the meat carefully and place it in a roasting pan, discarding the green onion and broth.  If you did this right, especially in the pressure cooker, the meat will fall apart, so you may need a slotted spoon.  Try to let as much of the liquid drain out as possible, which should contain a lot of the rendered fat from the pork.

Shred the pork with two forks, removing large bits of fat to lean it out some.  Drizzle some cooking liquid over and throw in the oven to crisp up

Grab two forks and shred the meat into bite-sized pieces.  As you shred the pork, it will be obvious where there are large lumps of unrendered fat.  You can pull these out and discard, making for a much more lean finished dish.  After you've shredded thoroughly, ladle back on about 1 cup of the cooking liquid from the pot, which you are welcome to run through a fat separator to avoid consuming the rendered fat.

After a few minutes in a very hot oven, the pork will develop an excellent crispy exterior without getting too dried out.  Don't leave it in too long.

Bake for about 20 minutes until the meat is brown and crispy.  Heat the tortillas and enjoy, serving with your favorite chili sauce, queso fresco, chopped onions, and cilantro.  Garnish with cilantro-lime rice, radishes, black beans, fried plantains, or whatever you like.

I had vegetarian friends over, so I added some pan-roasted vegetables with sofrito and vegetarian black beans

This dish also happens to freeze well, and has a number of leftover uses.  Put it over nachos, make it into a breakfast burrito, throw it in tacos, etc.  Basically, in the words of Jim Gaffigan, all you need is "a tortilla filled with meat, cheese, or vegetables", and you can recreate essentially any form of Tex-Mex food.  But at least with this recipe you know your dish will be a winner.