The Ultimate Carnitas - In A Dutch Oven!!!

This easy recipe has gotten great responses from all who have tasted it:
Use pork butt or shoulder. i can easily fit 2 - 4ib. roasts in my dutch oven. Trim off excess fat and separate into 3" X 3" chunks (approx.).
Season chunks with the following:
garlic salt, garlic pepper, onion powder, cayenne pepper, montreal steak seasoning and paprika.
Brown all sides in a frying pan with oil.
Remove and re-season AGAIN!
Preheat oven to 350F. Put all the meat in the dutch oven and add 1 to 1-1/2 cans of Coca Cola!
Cook for three hours. YOU WILL BE AMAZED!

Last fall went on a family cruise to Mexico. The let us off for a day in Ensenada where we went through town to go to this amazing blowhole on the coast.

Driving through town on Saturday AM, out in front of every meat market, taqueria, or mom-n-pop corner market were men tending large, round cast iron cauldrons over an open flame underneath.

I asked our bus driver what everyone was making. The answer was Carnitas!

I began drooling immediately.

There they insist on deep frying large pork chunks in lard.

They also insist on using these large round cast iron cauldrons. They're shaped like the kind you see in cartoons that a Witch might be stirring, or the kind that some Cannibals would be cooking Dr. Livingston in. You know, that kind. Anyway, everyone was deep frying their Carnitas in these things outside over an open fire. Just wood logs on the ground. Nothing fancy like a turkey fryer in sight!

Anyway, I begged the driver to stop but we had to stick to a schedule and couldn't.

I would have loved to have stopped and watched and talked to those guys about how they do it.

Anyway, deep frying or braising in Coca Cola, in a round cauldron or a dutch oven, cast iron seems to be the way to go.

...And what is it with Coca Cola and pork that seems to work so well? My mom taught me to add a can of coke to the baked ham. Works like a charm!!!

Oh man dude! Carnitas! I haven't had carnitas is sooo long! We have the great Mexican restaurant near by and they have these carnitas that are simmered or whatever the way they are cooked in this amazing red sauce, its absolutely out of this world! I MUST try your recipe now!

cheers,

Ian