Amazingly Fabulous and Utterly Delicious Carnitas

I used to dislike Mexican food when I was younger and now I just can't seem to get enough of it. When the weather is warm, I'm always craving fish tacos, but in the winter I usually just make them with chicken. Well, I wanted to spice things up a bit so I was on the lookout for something new to put in my tacos and stumbled upon a gem of a recipe. Surprise, surprise, I found it on Pinterest. I've adapted my recipe from the My Kitchen Escapades Blog - Pork Carnitas recipe but apparently, that recipe is an adaptation from Cooks Illustrated. 

I've made this twice in the past two weeks, once with pork butt (which is a cut of the shoulder) and once with pork shoulder. Hands down, I liked the pork butt best. What can I say? I'm an ass girl. The key with this recipe is low and slow. It takes a good 3 hours from start to finish in the process but the result is moist and flavorful pork that's perfect in tacos or on a salad, or just by itself. 

Ingredients:
3-4 pounds of pork butt
1 white onion
1 orange juiced and the remaining halves
2 cups of water
Juice of one lime
2 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp oregano
2 bay leaves
2 cloves of garlic

Instructions: 
1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees. 

2. Trim the fat from the pork butt and cut into 2 inch cubes.  

3. Put all ingredients in a stove and oven safe pot. I really need to get a dutch oven, but I used this cast aluminum caldero (that was a wedding shower gift) instead. The top is not oven safe because it has a plastic handle but I just unscrewed the handle and made it oven safe. Bring the liquid to a simmer on high heat. Once simmering, cover and put in oven and cook for 2 hours. 

4. Remove dish from oven and immediately turn on broiler to high. 

5. Using a slotted spoon remove all meat and put on a cookie sheet covered with tin foil. Remove onions, orange, and bay leaves and discard. 

6. Put remaining liquid on stovetop on medium-high head and reduce liquid to about one cup. 

7. While the liquid reduces shred beef into small pieces. 

8. Once liquid reduces put the shredded meat into the liquid so each piece is fully coated. Put meat back on cookie sheet and put into the oven. Broil for 6 minutes. 

9. Remove tray and turn meat - broil for another 6 mintues. 

10. Yummmmm

11. Assemble tacos. I make fresh guacamole and a cilantro lime sour cream for a topping. It was so tasty! 

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