Slow-Cooked Carnitas — The Forty-Three-Days-Remaining Sunday

I submitted the TCC early action application Friday at four-forty-seven in the afternoon, Central Time, sitting at the kitchen table in my AP English hoodie with my hair in a messy bun and my hands shaking slightly when I clicked the final submit button. The portal flashed a green confirmation banner across the top of the screen and a status bar slid into place that said, “Submitted — awaiting decision — estimated notification mid-December.” I sat in front of the laptop for ten full minutes after that, not doing anything, just looking at the green banner like it might unsay itself if I looked away. Mr. Briggs had told me Tuesday morning to submit Friday before the Halloween server traffic, and I’d done it twenty-six hours before the November first deadline.

Mama was at the diner pulling the four-to-eight Friday shift. I texted her: “TCC submitted. 4:47 PM.” She wrote back four minutes later, on her break, just two words: “Done. Now eat.” That’s how Mama handles big news. No exclamation points, no all-caps celebration. A two-word verdict and a redirection to the basic act that keeps a person upright. I made myself a peanut butter sandwich and stood at the counter eating it with the laptop screen still glowing “Submitted” in the corner of my eye, and I thought about how the rest of senior year was now going to be a long quiet wait until December fifteenth or thereabouts.

Sunday I made slow-cooker carnitas because the application was finally off my desk and Cody was forty-three days out and the kitchen wanted something braised and forgiving and slow. A three-pound pork shoulder — bone-in, fat cap on, six-fifty for the whole roast at IGA which works out to two-something a pound, the cheapest meat-per-meal you can buy short of dried beans — scored across the fat cap in a crosshatch with a sharp knife, salted heavily on every surface, into the slow cooker with the juice of two oranges and a fat lime, a smashed head of garlic with the papery skin still mostly on, two teaspoons of cumin, two teaspoons of dried oregano, one whole dried chipotle pepper from a small jar I’d picked up at a Mexican grocery in Tulsa back in August, and the trick I keep coming back to: a quarter-cup of whole milk poured over the top before the lid goes on.

The milk is the thing nobody tells you about. It’s a Mexican grandmother trick I read about in a James Beard cookbook from the library — the milk fat coats the muscle fibers as the pork breaks down over the long braise and the result is a silkier, more tender shred than any other liquid will give you. The milk solids curdle and disappear into the braise; you don’t see them at the end. You taste the difference. Eight hours on low. The pork came apart with two forks at the seven-and-a-half-hour mark and I knew it was done because the bone slid out of the meat clean.

I shredded the whole shoulder in a wide bowl, ladled about a cup of the cooking liquid back over the meat to keep it juicy, and then crisped it under the broiler on a half-sheet pan lined with foil in two batches for the bottom-of-the-pan crust that’s the entire reason carnitas are different from regular shredded pork. The broiler trick: a single layer of pork on the sheet pan, a quick pour of about a third-cup of the braising liquid over the meat to keep it from drying, two minutes under high broil, then a flip with the tongs and another two minutes. Watch it. At three minutes the edges char black; at two minutes they’re crisp brown. The bottom of the pan caramelizes the cooking liquid into a dark glaze that sticks to the meat when you flip it. That’s the difference. That’s the texture you want.

Mama and I made tacos at the kitchen counter Sunday night, side by side, hip to hip in the narrow space between the sink and the stove, her with corn tortillas warmed directly over the gas burner with tongs until they got those little black blisters and me with flour because flour is what I grew up on. We didn’t talk much. I knew she was thinking about Cody — the back bedroom is now empty and freshly painted, his old sheets washed and waiting in the closet, the calendar on the kitchen wall ticking down. She knew I was thinking about the application and the long wait. The carnitas held all of it. We had leftovers Monday and Tuesday. The smoky orange-and-lime broth at the bottom of the cooker, strained and reduced down to a half-cup of glossy syrup, went onto rice for Wednesday’s lunch and made even a Tuesday-leftover bowl taste like Sunday.

The quarter-cup of milk is the trick. Don’t skip it. Here’s the eight-hour build with the broiler crust at the end.

Slow-Cooked Carnitas

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 8 hrs | Total Time: 8 hrs 15 min | Servings: 10

Ingredients

• 3 lbs boneless pork shoulder, cut into 3-inch chunks
• 1 tablespoon kosher salt
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 2 teaspoons chili powder
• 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 medium white onion, roughly chopped
• 1 orange, juiced (about 1/3 cup)
• 2 tablespoons lime juice
• 1/4 cup chicken broth
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• Slider buns and coleslaw, for serving

Instructions

1. Season the pork. In a small bowl, combine salt, pepper, cumin, chili powder, smoked paprika, and oregano. Rub the spice mixture all over the pork chunks until evenly coated.
2. Layer the slow cooker. Add the chopped onion and garlic to the bottom of a slow cooker. Place the seasoned pork on top in a single layer.
3. Add the liquid. Pour the orange juice, lime juice, chicken broth, and olive oil over the pork.
4. Cook low and slow. Cover and cook on LOW for 8 hours, or on HIGH for 4 to 5 hours, until the pork is fork-tender and falling apart.
5. Shred the meat. Remove the pork from the slow cooker and shred it using two forks, discarding any large pieces of fat. Return the shredded meat to the juices in the cooker and toss to coat.
6. Crisp it up (optional). For crispier carnitas, spread the shredded pork on a foil-lined baking sheet and broil for 3 to 5 minutes until the edges are caramelized and slightly crisped.
7. Assemble and serve. Pile the carnitas onto slider buns and serve with coleslaw on the side. Pack leftovers in a sealed container —they travel well and taste even better the next day.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 310 | Protein: 28g | Fat: 18g | Carbs: 6g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 540mg