Let’s cut to the chase. Cola. Condensed Milk. Pig. All having fun times in a pot. Traditional? Nope. Delicious? Yes.
A few days ago I was half-reading my Kindle, half-watching yet another Diners,Drive-ins & Dives repeat on the Food Network channel and Guy Fieri wanders into a Mexican eatery that serves “killer” tacos. The sassy owner starts to share her family recipe for carnitas and my ears perk up when I hear the words “condensed milk”. Grab the remote control. Live-rewind. Yep, she’s actually pouring a whole can of the sweet stuff onto the pork… She doesn’t stop there -next goes in a can of coke.
If you don’t know what carnitas are, they’re usually bits of shredded pork that are fried, after being cooked low-and-slow for a few hours.
“But Food Dawg.. Why are you acting surprised? You add sweet stuff to your pulled pork” I hear you cry.
My problem isn’t the sugar content..it’s the milk. A few years ago I tried making what I believed to be a traditional Colombian dish – Lomo con leche (LCL). Pork loin, slowly simmered in cow’s milk (with a bit of this and that). The resultant dish was not inedible, but it looked gross and seriously lacked punch. The recipe for both the carnitas and LCL share similar concepts, but differ in intensities.
Firstly – you’re using pork shoulder (or pork butt, if you’re American…what is up with your meat names?) which I prefer over tenderloin. It’s cheaper and holds way more flavour (fat)!
Secondly – the condensed milk & cola really adds richness to the flavour of the finished carnitas, as well as allowing them to crisp up & caramelise ever so slightly. LCL’s full fat milk just doesn’t cut it.
Thirdly – both use ridiculous amounts of garlic, though LCL also called for the addition of bay leaves, some lemon and thyme. I think these extras get a little lost and would probably introduce them as a separate element.
Key stats – I’d estimate you’d get about 5-6 servings of carnitas out of these measurements. You’re looking at spending about £8<cost<£10 in total. Also, this takes about 3 hours, although not much hands-on.
Ingredients –
- I spent about £5.50 on a boneless pork shoulder..about 750g.
- Can of condensed milk (whatever size you can find)
- 500ml bottle of non-diet coke (I went for vanilla coke because I don’t read labels properly. It works well)
- Whole bulb of garlic
- Cinnamon sticks – 2
- Some water
- Salt, pepper, olive oil. Not much.
Chop your pork shoulder into four chunks – apple/tennis ball/baseball sized. I would leave the fat on at this stage. You can always remove it at the end of cooking & still benefit from the flavour that it adds. Heat a little olive oil in a big pot and get those pork pieces sizzling. Once coloured all over, throw in the condensed milk and bottle of cola and stir well. Chop the base off the whole garlic bulb and throw that in too (don’t bother peeling). Throw in the cinnamon sticks whole.
The pork pieces should be sticking out of the liquid by about 2-2.5cm. If they’re already drowning in the condensed milk/cola mixture, you don’t need to add any water. Bring the liquid to a gentle bubbly boil, then set the heat to low and cover your pot. Check the pot every half an hour or so, stirring and flipping the meat about. Ignore the curdling condensed milk. This happens when you cook milky things for too long and in any case, you’ll be chucking the soup away. You’ll want to cook it for about two and a half hours.
Once done, remove the meat from the pot. You might have to scrape away some gross looking curds. At this stage you can be really boring and remove the fat. You shouldn’t even have to rake the meat with utensils/fingers – the meat should be so tender that a gentle squeeze will have it falling apart. Now..if you’re going to eat immediately, then move onto the next step. Otherwise you can keep the meaty bits in the fridge, until you’re ready.
Throw some of the meat into a frying pan and cook until slightly crisped. You should smell a bit of caramel – something that the condensed milk & cola helped out with. Now serve it up with whatever you’re eating and enjoy.
PS – I’ve not actually thrown away the cooking liquid yet. I’ll experiment and see what can be done with something so sweet and garlicky..
FOOD DAWG 