couple of newbie questions, and a cool update

Carnitas are just pieces of pork. Carnita literally means, little meat in Spanish. So that may explain why your last girlfriend called you that.

The bags labeled pork for carnitas usually have the pork already cut into chunks.

Grilling strips are the brisket trimmed from pork spare ribs. HEB runs those down here all the time for 99cents/lb.

They may be whole, but most times they look like stew meat.

jgh1204 said:

Carnitas are just pieces of pork. Carnita literally means, little meat in Spanish. So that may explain why your last girlfriend called you that.

Click to expand...

LOL. Yeah, I bought those once as I thought it was pork shoulder. They do cook up fine in the smoker, but they do better as cuban pork and this stuff is good. Got a lot of hints from Qman on how to prepare this.

1 1/2 lb Pork shoulder or butt cut
-into 1-1/2" cubes
1/3 c Vinegar
2 tb Soy sauce
1 ts Salt
3 Cloves garlic, minced
1 Small bay leaf
1/4 ts Pepper
1 tb Sugar
1/2 c Water
2 tb Cooking oil

1. Combine all ingredients except cooking oil in a pot and let stand for
at least 30 minutes.

2. Simmer covered for 1 hour or until meat is tender. Drain and reserve
the sauce.

3. Heat cooking oil in a skillet. Brown meat on all sides. Transfer to a
serving dish.

4. Pour off all remaining oil from skillet. Add reserved sauce and cook
for a minute or two scraping all browned bits sticking to pan. Pour sauce
over meat and serve.

Variation: May be done with chicken or a combination of chicken and pork.
Beef or chicken livers may be added too if desired.

Preparation time: 10 minutes plus marinating time. Cooking time: 1 hour,
15 minutes Serves: 4 to 6

Recipes by Dennis Santiago, TWS bbs (1-310-676-0492), formatted by Manny
Rothstein (1/24/94)

Kevin's notes: 2/19/2006. Just delicous as is. Don't mess with success.
3/22/2006. Still