Saturday, February 8, 2014

Carnitas II

Carnitas taco with guacamole and cilantro & onions. So so good.
Crisp and tender carnitas

I have another recipe for Carnitas on this blog, but I really think I like this version better. Even the leftovers taste better. Its beauty is in its simplicity--only two ingredients. It's been a while (like a week) since I did this, so I'm not even sure what my complete process was. I know it involved looking up recipes on Pinterest  and then finding Center Cut Cook (a fantastic food blog, by the way), and adapted what she did there to my purposes and time allowances. Looking back at her recipe, I only used her method for the second round in the oven, but I got the idea from her.
Anyway, one of the awesome things about this recipe, besides being delicious, is that you can do almost anything with the leftovers, since it's only seasoning comes from the chicken broth. You can make pulled pork sandwiches or taquitos the next day without worrying about overpowering flavors.
I like it. I'll be doing this again soon.


Carnitas
    --Adapted from CenterCutCook

Ingredients:
  • 3.5 to 4 pound pork shoulder roast, boneless
  • 2 cups chicken broth
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 280 degrees Fahrenheit.
Place roast in a covered roasting or baking dish or Dutch oven. Pour chicken broth over roast, cover with foil, and then place cover on top. 
Place in the oven and roast for 6-7 hours.
Remove roast to a plate and then pour the juices into a medium saucepan. Allow juice to settle and skim off most of the fat off the top. Do not discard the fat immediately, but reserve it in case you think you need it in the next phase of cooking.
Turn oven up to 400 degrees. Heat the juices over medium heat until liquid is reduced by about half. You want to have about a half cup of liquid, but if you have a lot of liquid even after reducing, you may want to just use 1/2 cup of it.
Shred or cut the roast into chunks. It's fine and good to have uneven sizes. Place cut/shredded meat onto a nonstick cookie sheet or open roasting pan. Pour about 1/2 cup of reduced juices onto the meat. 
Roast the meat on the cookie sheet for about 20 minutes or so, until it gets crisp here and there and seems to be sizzling in its own fat.
Remove from oven and place in a serving dish.
Serve with tortillas (flour or corn--I like corn for carnitas), guacamole, and salsa or onions & cilantro. And maybe some Mexican rice.





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