Paleo Mexican “Makeover Leftover” Pork Carnitas
So what do you do when you have too much leftover pork? You don’t throw it away silly!! Don’t you know there are starving, homeless people?!?!? And how about those crazy Paleo, CrossFit cultish people?!?! They would deadlift you if they found out you threw away a perfectly good source of protein. Well all jokes aside, I usually refer to myself as the Leftover Queen (who never wastes food and will eat every last bite of anything she cooks) but this girl (and family) do get tired of leftovers…sometimes. Well this week I made a pork shoulder that could feed an Army. After a few days of eating pork in our eggs, throwing pork in our salads for lunch and eating it for dinner, we had enough. Instead of throwing it away I decided to give it a face lift or makeover if you will.
My “makeover leftover” recipe was inspired by my fave paleo blogger that I am utterly obsessed with. Come on, who isn’t? Her recipe is a Barbacoa recipe which is actually made of beef. Differences with my recipe is, of course, mine is pork. Also, in her recipe, her means of cooking this leftover meal was to throw everything back in the crock pot and cook for 1 hour. I just took my leftover shredded pork and put it in a covered sauce pan for 20 minutes to cook and it was done! I found no need to throw it back in the crock pot. Wow, for once I used a pan over my crock pot; I never thought I would see that day. Either way, I was so happy how it turned out. The kids loved it too which, as you know, is a plus in my house.
- 3lbs of leftover shredded pork shoulder
- 1 (8 oz) can of tomato sauce
- 1 (7 oz) can of green chiles
- 1 tablespoon of chili powder
- 2 teaspoons of cayenne pepper
- 1 teaspoon of crushed red pepper
- ½ teaspoon of paprika
- ½ teaspoon of nutmeg
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- salt and pepper, to taste
- avocado to garnish
- Cook pork in lightly greased saucepan on medium heat. Pour in tomato sauce and green chiles and stir.
- Place dry ingredients in and stir again.
- Cover the pan up, put on low heat, and forget about it for 20 minutes. It's like that rotisserie chicken commercial, set it and forget it!
- Then garnish with fresh avocados and eat up! Eat fast because I promise you it will not last.
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- Carnitas Leftover Ingredients
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- Step 1: Cook the carnitas with tomato sauce and green chiles then mix in dry spices
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- Cooked Carnitas in covered sauce pan after 20 minutes of cooking on low heat Carnitas all done
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- Carnitas all done. I know you want to grab it through the computer and taste it
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- The carnitas wasn’t going in fast enough for Julian. He had thirds tonight!
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- Now you know why I always cook; to think if I didn’t, I would miss that cute satisfied face. Jackson, as you can see, is a tougher critic
And that’s it guys.
You.will.be.in.love.PROMISE.
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I’m so glad I found this post! My inlaws grilled carnitas straight out of the package and they weren’t good at all. (no flavor or seasoning!) I followed your recipe along with 12 oz of beer and 1/2 cup of orange juice in the crockpot for 3-4 hours on low. (so I guess it wasn’t Paleo anymore) It turned out great! Thanks so much!
A little beer didn’t hurt anyone 🙂 Glad you like it!!!