Easy Crockpot Carnitas

Me and my crockpot were at it again last night!

You'll just have to believe me when I say that we actually ate these awesome carnitas as tacos, since this is literally the only picture I took of the entire meal. I know you won't have any trouble believing me when I say that these are, perhaps, the best thing I've ever made in my crockpot.

Crockpot Carnitas
adapted from Kelle Hampton

Ingredients

• one 1lb pork tenderloin
• 1 onion, roughly chopped
• 1/2 jar salsa verde
• 1 can diced tomatoes
• 1/2 can chopped green chiles
• 1/4 cup red salsa
• 1/2 can black beans

Method

1. Put pork tenderloin and chopped onion in your crockpot
2. Pour salsa verde, diced tomatoes, green chiles, and red salsa over the pork.
3. Cook on low for 8 hours. Use a fork to shred pork near the end of cooking.
4. Around 20 minutes before serving, add black beans and stir to combine. Allow to heat through.
5. Serve with tortillas, avocado, more salsa, sour cream, etc.

Seriously, they could not be easier. If you don't eat pork (or just don't like it), I imagine you could do these with chicken as well. I would use bone-in, skinless breasts and thighs. As evidenced from my experience cooking a whole chicken in the crockpot, the meat will shred nicely (but you might need to use your fingers).

And after dinner, you can enjoy hazelnut butter on whole wheat toast with chocolate chips. Yum.

2 for 1 Crockpot Chicken

If you are like me, you don't blog for a living. And if you don't blog for a living, that means you probably have a job (or school) that requires you to leave your house every day for an extended period of time, therefore making it difficult sometimes to find the time to make dinner.

This is why I love my crockpot. Do you have a crockpot? Mine was the first thing I registered for when B and I got engaged. I remember my mom using the crockpot all winter long when I was a kid. I would come home from the school and the house would smell amazing and dinner would be ready. It's a super time-saver.

That's not to say that all crockpot recipes are winners. I've had my share of duds. And nothing stinks more than coming home expecting dinner to be ready only to find out that dinner needs to be thrown out and you have to start all over from scratch.

That said, roasting a chicken is my favorite way to use my crockpot. It's foolproof.

What you'll need:

• 1 whole chicken
• 1 lemon
• 1 onion
• 3-4 garlic cloves, peeled
• salt, pepper, thyme

Toss the chicken in the crockpot with the lemon (cut in half), the onion (cut in quarters), and the garlic cloves. Season with salt, pepper, and thyme, set the crockpot to low, and go to work.

When you come home, you'll have a chicken so moist it is literally falling off the bone.

Separate the meat from the bones. You'll have a bowl full of delicious, perfectly-roasted chicken meat:

And a bowl full of.... gunk:

You'll be tempted to throw the gunk out, but I beseech you - DO NOT!

Instead, rinse out your crockpot and toss the gunk back in it. You're making chicken stock now!


I usually toss in an onion, a few carrots, some garlic cloves, and several wilted celery stalks along with spices (1t each thyme, basil, sage, and whole peppercorns). Really, almost any veggies will do. I was fresh out of wilted celery this week, but I had some wilted scallions, so they got tossed in. Sometimes, I'll use a potato. Whatever you've got, throw it in. Then, fill your crockpot about 3/4 full with water, set it to low and walk away.

I cooked mine overnight, but you could let it cook during the day too. It needs about 10 hours (more won't hurt).

When it's done, let it cool for an hour or so, then strain it and let it hang out in the fridge for a little longer. Skim the fat off the top and you're good to go. I like to freeze mine in 1/2-1c baggies so it is easy to use, but if you use stock super-regularly, you could just keep it in the fridge in a tupperware.

Oh, in case you were wondering, I used my roasted chicken in this yummy Butternut Squash Orzo dish from The Little Red House. It was divine (despite the crappy lighting).