What is Carnitas?
Carnitas is a fabulous dish in Mexican cuisine that usually uses pork. Type of pork used is often front sections of the hog or pork shoulder. These cuts are braised or roasted for a long time, sometimes the length of a day. Cooking the pork fully is only the beginning preparation for carnitas. The pork is then shredded or pulled and cooked in lard, which creates very crispy meat with a tender, melt in the mouth center.
According to Wikipedia, “Carnitas (from the Spanish for “little meats”) is a type of braised or roasted (often after first being boiled) pork in Mexican cuisine.” I used a salsa verde recipe off of SimplyRecipes.com, and got to work. You need a large enough pot with a lid (a Dutch oven is best, because it seals in the steam), and a casserole dish. You’ll be boiling and simmering the meat first to get it tender, and then putting it into the casserole dish and tearing it into shreds with some forks. This is the hardest part, IMHO. For 3.5 lbs of pork, using the sanitary method of dual-fork shredding, my fingers were frickin’ tired from grasping and shredding for a good 30 minutes or so. Fortunately the meat falls easily from the bone. The rest is easy…the recipe is highly accurate and indeed simple. A couple other tips: – Salsa verde: If you buy it, 2 cups is a little more than 2 small cans of Herdez Salsa Verde. I just used 2 cans of the stuff and the dish still turned out fine. – Slici
