Apparently the youngest won’t go to sleep…

…so while I’m on ‘chase him back into bed’ watch I’d appreciate it if people could give a look-over of this Homesick Texan Carnitas recipe that I found online and offer up any suggestions on how the recipe could be improved.  I’ve already tried one batch and it came out fine, but it never hurts to get more input.

8 thoughts on “Apparently the youngest won’t go to sleep…”

  1. Add a little adobo, and if you can put your hands on some achiote, it adds an interesting zing and great color. It stains permanently though.

  2. I can’t hardly believe you get enough salt with only 1 tsp for 4 lbs of pork, and often recipes that are “missing something” are just under-salted.

    If you’re pretty sure you’re good on salt, though, I imagine either oregano or bay leaf would kick things up a notch.

    1. Well, naturally I used more salt than that. I’m actually pretty good with the recipe, except that it was not quite as outer crispy as it could have been.

  3. I agree with @Kenneth, it definitely seems tremendously light on the salt like by a couple of tablespoons. If I were going to do this recipe, I’d probably also add some bittering to the simmer – half a bottle of Shiner Bock, with the other half to the cook, would work nicely. In fact, I’d add a bunch more garlic and cumin as well, this seems like a basic flavorless Yankee recipe from the description.

    For me, when I do carnitas I’d basically start by braising the pork in a quarter cup of bacon grease or lard for a bit with some bay leaves, then mix in the citrus. I’d then add garlic, onion, oregano, salt, to taste, in much larger quantities than mentioned on this recipe. Add half a beer for some liquid, simmer for a couple of hours, Or you could actually do all of this in a slow cooker on low all day for dinner, although I’d probably still do the bacon grease/bay leaves step separately first, for a few minutes before putting it in the slow cooker.

  4. Replace the water with something with some flava’ to it. Beef stock? Mexican style cervesa? A combination of the two?

  5. If it’s not crispy enough, either you need to speed caramelization (up the OJ) or turn up the heat on the pork in the last 10 minutes, or both.

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