Easy Oven Carnitas

Pork carnitas are simple. Cut up the pork butt, add a few spices, and a lime. Pop them into the oven for a slow roast—no big fuss or mess. Have one of your favorites at home today.

Table of Contents

• 🐖Pork Butt
• ♨️The Method
• 🧂Seasoning
• 📖Other Carnitas Recipes
• 🖼️Step-by-Step Photo Instructions
• 📖Recipe

Introduction

One of our standard restaurant meals is carnitas. If you are unaware of this Mexican classic, they are basically chunks of pork butt cooked with seasoning.

Also known as "little meats," and sometimes called Mexican pulled pork, they can be found on the street in Mexico cooking in large vats of lard. Not a good option for us home-cooking Yankees.

I have done carnitas multiple ways (never in lard). The most common method that I see recommended is braising chuck of pork butt in a spiced-up fluid of some type and then cooking off the liquid either on the stovetop or in an oven.

That method works nicely but is a fair amount of work and makes a heck of a mess.  I have done this a number of times (not published), and it was very tasting. But the work to food ratio was high for me.

There is a much easier method, and the major issue, which is the horrible mess I usually make at home, is gone.

My Rating

Low 5 or high 4 range. Much of the fat drains due to the rack, so the "greasy factor" is markedly decreased.

🐖Pork Butt

Like many cuts of meat, there are multiple names about the same thing. Pork butt, Boston butt, and Pork shoulder are the same in common usage.

A "real" pork shoulder is really the thinner area of this cut but is commonly cooked and used the same as the butt, but usually, the term pork shoulder is used interchangeably with pork butt and Boston butt.

I do suggest a boneless butt to simplify by letting the butcher cut the bone out. Just make your life easier.

♨️The Method

I needed a really simple technique. And finding a recipe to model was a major problem.

The simplest was at instructables.com, but I had a few issues. It required flipping, I felt it would probably overcook, and it was not on a rack, so the pork would cook in the drained out fat and juice, which I wanted to avoid.

My method is simple enough for the average home cook to make. So here, we cut the pork into chunks, season, spread on a rack, cover and bake for a while in a low oven then uncover for a while, almost everybody can do this.

I do suggest a boneless pork butt to simplify by letting the butcher cut the bone out, which can be more work than you appreciate.

The rack will lift the meat out of the rendered fat and improve cooking on all sides without flipping.

🧂Seasoning

The seasoning of carnitas is highly variable. It can just be salt or use lots of other spices and herbs.  There may or may not be citruses like lime or orange. So season to your taste.

📖Other Carnitas Recipes

Crock Pot Pork Carnitas

Healthier Pork Tenderloin Carnitas

Chicken Carnitas AKA Carnitas de Pollo

🖼️Step-by-Step Photo Instructions

Preheat oven to 250° convection or 275° conventional.

Prepare a sheet pan with foil and a rack. Give the rack a heavy spray of PAM.

Cut a 3-4 pound boneless pork butt into about 2-inch chunks. Trim big chunks of fat only. You could do bone-in butt, but you will just be making your life harder.

Place pork in a large mixing bowl. Add the juice of one lime. Mix well. Add 1 tablespoon chili powder, 1 teaspoon cumin, ½ teaspoon garlic powder, 1 teaspoon kosher salt, and ½ teaspoon pepper. Mix well. Change the seasoning if you wish.

Transfer meat to the prepared pan. Distribute evenly but largest chunks in the corners.

Cover with foil.

Roast in the preheated oven for 2 ½ hours. Remove foil and continue to roast about 2 more hours until internal temperature is 195° to 200° on the biggest pieces.

Allow to rest for 10 minutes before serving.

📖Recipe

Easy Oven Carnitas

From Dan Mikesell AKA DrDan

Pork carnitas are simple. Cut up the pork butt, add a few spices, and a lime. Pop them into the oven for a slow roast—no big fuss or mess. Have one of your favorites at home today.

Tap to leave a Rating

4.11 from 19 votes

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Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 4 hours 30 minutes

Total Time: 4 hours 45 minutes

Servings #/Adjust if desired 6

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Ingredients

US Customary - Convert to Metric

• ▢ 3-4 pounds boneless pork butt
• ▢ 1 juice of lime
• ▢ 1 tablespoon chili powder
• ▢ 1 teaspoon cumin
• ▢ ½ teaspoons garlic powder
• ▢ 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• ▢ ½ teaspoon pepper

Instructions

Photos ONOFF

• Preheat oven to 250° convection or 275° conventional
  
• Prepare a sheet pan with foil and a rack. Give the rack a heavy spray of PAM.
  
• Cut a 3-4 pound boneless pork butt into about 2-inch chunks. Trim away any big chunks of fat. Place pork in a large mixing bowl. Add the juice of one lime. Mix well.
  
• Add 1 tablespoon chili powder, 1 teaspoon cumin, ½ teaspoon garlic powder, 1 teaspoon kosher salt, and ½ teaspoon pepper. Mix well.
  
• Transfer meat to the prepared pan. Distribute evenly but largest chunks in the corners. Cover with foil.
  
• Roast in the preheated oven for 2 ½ hours. Remove foil and continue to roast about 2 more hours until internal temperature is 195° to 200° on the biggest pieces.
  
• Allow to rest for 10 minutes before serving.
  

See the step-by-step photos in the post. Some recipes have an option to display the photos here with a switch above these instructions but the photos DO NOT print.

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Recipe Notes

Pro Tips

1. The recipe calls for a 3-4 pounds boneless pork butt but you can use a bigger butt with no problem. A bone-in butt is fine but just more work.
2. It is important to put the thicker pieces of pork to the corners and the outside edge of the tray.
3. Time estimates are based on 2 to 2 ½ inch chunks. Smaller chunks of pork will cook much faster.
4. You can do this without the rack but the bottom will be setting in the fat and drainage.
5. Season as you want.
6. The final temperature endpoint is the most important part of this recipe. Never cook by time alone.
7. Serve with tortillas and toppings of your choice.
8. Good refrigerated for 3-4 days or frozen for 3-4 months.

The nutrition information on this is obviously variable due to the nature of pork butt.

To adjust the recipe size:

You may adjust the number of servings in this recipe card under servings. This does the math for the ingredients for you. BUT it does NOT adjust the text of the instructions. So you need to do that yourself.

Nutrition Estimate

Calories : 307 kcal (15%) | Carbohydrates : 2 g (1%) | Protein : 43 g (86%) | Fat : 13 g (20%) | Saturated Fat : 5 g (25%) | Cholesterol : 136 mg (45%) | Sodium : 558 mg (23%) | Potassium : 801 mg (23%) | Fiber : 1 g (4%) | Sugar : 1 g (1%) | Vitamin A : 395 IU (8%) | Vitamin C : 2 mg (2%) | Calcium : 39 mg (4%) | Iron : 3 mg (17%)

Serving size is my estimate of a normal size unless stated otherwise. The number of servings per recipe is stated above. This is home cooking, and there are many variables. All nutritional information are estimates and may vary from your actual results. To taste ingredients such as salt will be my estimate of the average used.

Course : Main Course

Cuisine : Mexican

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Editor's Note: Originally Published October 1, 2017. Updated with expanded options, refreshed photos, and a table of contents to help navigation.