Crosshairy
Well-Known Member
I apologize in advance for not taking any pictures, but I was in a terrible hurry to prep for my friend's going away party (moving out of the country) and it didn't occur to me until all the food was eaten.
Basic ingredients:
[*]venison
[*]1-2 cans of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce (you could recreate this with fresh peppers very easily, but the adobo sauce adds a nice flavor
[*]Your favorite seasoning for Mexican-inspired food. Fajita seasoning mixes work well here, too. The sauce packets are really fast and forgiving if the meat gets dry or you have folks who absolutely don't want to taste venison.
[*]Bacon fat or your favorite oil for cooking
[*]Several onions; yellow is preferred, but any will do.
[*]taco-sized tortillas (8-10")
[*]Your favorite garnishes (lettuce, avocado/guac, lime, sliced radishes, etc.)
Cheese dip/sauce:
Easy method is white Pancho's cheese dip, or white queso Velveeta. I decided to try a home-made option...
[*]Can of evaporated milk (half & half or heavy cream could also work, but it can get lumpy if you over-heat)
[*]White American cheese & pepperjack cheese blocks (I used 16 oz of each to feed a group of 10). Mozzarella can also be used, but it gets thick and doesn't pour easily. I found this out first-hand
and next time will stick to American/Pepperjack
[*]If you like it spicier, get a can of green chilis or mix in a dry rub seasoning, meat, or anything else you want to try.
Cooking implements:
Smoker and/or crock pot
Large skillet or (preferably) a large electric griddle if making a lot of food for larger groups.
Sauce pan or second large skillet for cheese dip
Crock pot liners are a time-saver here, but obviously not necessary. They sell them in the zip-lock bag section of most grocery stores.
I smoked about 4 lbs of venison ham roast (literally any meat cut would work here, including shoulder, neck roast, or shanks) for about 6 hours at ~190 F after rubbing it down with a Latin-inspired spice mixture that my wife bought me. Based on the smell and taste, it's mostly made of paprika, salt, Mexican chili powder, garlic, and cayenne. When it came out of the smoker, it was pretty tender, not super moist due to the low fat content. I can speak from experience and tell you that you could just put it in the crock pot with the ingredients below and get a good result as well, but I wanted to try venison in the smoker, so...
After that got started, I got out a crock pot and cooked a few sliced up yellow onions (bite-sized pieces) and 2 cans of Adobo chilis (with sauce), enough water to cover the onions, and a healthy shake of garlic, Mexican chili powder, and some leftover bell peppers that I had sliced up. I cooked this on low heat for maybe 4 hours while I slept (I'm currently on night shift).
When I woke up, I put the venison in the crock pot and let it soak up juices and contribute the smoky flavor to the mix. The alternate approach here is to cook all of the aforementioned ingredients in the crock pot together. I've done this with pork shoulder and it worked perfectly well.
Unplug the crock pot and put the insert into the refrigerator to cool off (overnight, if you want), or set aside in a separate container to cool.
In a saucepan or large skillet, empty the can of evaporated milk or cream and heat it on medium-low heat. Don't let it start to boil heavily, or it can get a grainy texture. Begin adding hunks of your cheese(s) of choice and stirring them in to let them melt, doing handfuls of cheese at a time and stirring every couple of minutes so nothing separates out. My attempt included mozzarella cheese & pepperjack, and I ended up adding more half & half on top of the evaporated milk just to get that mozzarella cheese to thin out (although it tasted good). If you use other cheese types that aren't so "stringy", I don't think you'll have that problem and can use less milk. Once it's all melted, you can either leave it on low heat on the pan, or wash out that crock pot you were using and put it all in there to stay warm. That's a good spot to tinker with the flavor once you have the cheese melted.
Get out a cutting board and a large knife. Chop or tear the meat into small pieces, going across the grain to make it more tender. Mine looked like a cross between sliced BBQ brisket and chopped BBQ pork. The onions are probably cooked down enough that they won't need much/any chopping. Get a slotted spoon and retrieve the peppers and loose chunks of meat, and chop all of that up as well. Save the broth for now. Do a taste test to make sure the flavor is moving in the direction you want (you can make more adjustments in the next step), but realize that the flavor will get *stronger* with the following step, so don't over-do it.
Heat up the griddle to ~ 350 F and let it get hot enough that water dances off the top (similar to cooking pancakes). Add bacon grease or your preferred cooking oil, and then drop your meat/pepper/onion mixture onto the skillet to sear - use a slotted tool to leave the broth mostly behind, or you'll probably make a mess with all the splattering. The goal here is to char the ends of the meat very slightly and re-heat the mixture all at the same time. The key is not to overwhelm the skillet by covering it all up and cooling it off. It should stay HOT and cook pretty quickly. Using a spatula, flip it every 30 seconds or so. Pro tip: take some of the broth and any extra bacon grease you may have, and drizzle it over the meat while cooking in this step. What you are doing is boiling off the water, concentrating the flavor while caramelizing the veggies in the mixture. If you are using a regular skillet, or a griddle with a catch pan, you can drain the leftover liquids on top of the meat in the serving dish!
Heap your carnitas mixture into a serving dish as you are cooking it. I actually did this entire process an hour before the party get confident that it was going to be tasty, and then re-heated the food on the skillet in front of everyone as they arrived. This is a fun process, and it's sort of dramatic so folks get a kick out of watching it happen
For garnish/side items, we used lettuce, chopped cilantro, guacamole, and I cooked another couple of onions separately on the skillet since you really can't have enough of those.
I encourage you to try the cheese dip on top of the tacos themselves. There wasn't a single person who tried this and didn't like them. Some folks also used the meat with tortilla chips to make themselves nachos, which I heard were great. Because this recipe makes GREAT leftovers due to the veggies mixed with the meat to hold moisture, I suggest you over-estimate the meat requirement if you have some big eaters coming. Worst case, you have a killer meal the next day as well. Same comment goes for the cheese dip.
Basic ingredients:
[*]venison
[*]1-2 cans of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce (you could recreate this with fresh peppers very easily, but the adobo sauce adds a nice flavor
[*]Your favorite seasoning for Mexican-inspired food. Fajita seasoning mixes work well here, too. The sauce packets are really fast and forgiving if the meat gets dry or you have folks who absolutely don't want to taste venison.
[*]Bacon fat or your favorite oil for cooking
[*]Several onions; yellow is preferred, but any will do.
[*]taco-sized tortillas (8-10")
[*]Your favorite garnishes (lettuce, avocado/guac, lime, sliced radishes, etc.)
Cheese dip/sauce:
Easy method is white Pancho's cheese dip, or white queso Velveeta. I decided to try a home-made option...
[*]Can of evaporated milk (half & half or heavy cream could also work, but it can get lumpy if you over-heat)
[*]White American cheese & pepperjack cheese blocks (I used 16 oz of each to feed a group of 10). Mozzarella can also be used, but it gets thick and doesn't pour easily. I found this out first-hand
and next time will stick to American/Pepperjack[*]If you like it spicier, get a can of green chilis or mix in a dry rub seasoning, meat, or anything else you want to try.
Cooking implements:
Smoker and/or crock pot
Large skillet or (preferably) a large electric griddle if making a lot of food for larger groups.
Sauce pan or second large skillet for cheese dip
Crock pot liners are a time-saver here, but obviously not necessary. They sell them in the zip-lock bag section of most grocery stores.
I smoked about 4 lbs of venison ham roast (literally any meat cut would work here, including shoulder, neck roast, or shanks) for about 6 hours at ~190 F after rubbing it down with a Latin-inspired spice mixture that my wife bought me. Based on the smell and taste, it's mostly made of paprika, salt, Mexican chili powder, garlic, and cayenne. When it came out of the smoker, it was pretty tender, not super moist due to the low fat content. I can speak from experience and tell you that you could just put it in the crock pot with the ingredients below and get a good result as well, but I wanted to try venison in the smoker, so...
After that got started, I got out a crock pot and cooked a few sliced up yellow onions (bite-sized pieces) and 2 cans of Adobo chilis (with sauce), enough water to cover the onions, and a healthy shake of garlic, Mexican chili powder, and some leftover bell peppers that I had sliced up. I cooked this on low heat for maybe 4 hours while I slept (I'm currently on night shift).
When I woke up, I put the venison in the crock pot and let it soak up juices and contribute the smoky flavor to the mix. The alternate approach here is to cook all of the aforementioned ingredients in the crock pot together. I've done this with pork shoulder and it worked perfectly well.
Unplug the crock pot and put the insert into the refrigerator to cool off (overnight, if you want), or set aside in a separate container to cool.
In a saucepan or large skillet, empty the can of evaporated milk or cream and heat it on medium-low heat. Don't let it start to boil heavily, or it can get a grainy texture. Begin adding hunks of your cheese(s) of choice and stirring them in to let them melt, doing handfuls of cheese at a time and stirring every couple of minutes so nothing separates out. My attempt included mozzarella cheese & pepperjack, and I ended up adding more half & half on top of the evaporated milk just to get that mozzarella cheese to thin out (although it tasted good). If you use other cheese types that aren't so "stringy", I don't think you'll have that problem and can use less milk. Once it's all melted, you can either leave it on low heat on the pan, or wash out that crock pot you were using and put it all in there to stay warm. That's a good spot to tinker with the flavor once you have the cheese melted.
Get out a cutting board and a large knife. Chop or tear the meat into small pieces, going across the grain to make it more tender. Mine looked like a cross between sliced BBQ brisket and chopped BBQ pork. The onions are probably cooked down enough that they won't need much/any chopping. Get a slotted spoon and retrieve the peppers and loose chunks of meat, and chop all of that up as well. Save the broth for now. Do a taste test to make sure the flavor is moving in the direction you want (you can make more adjustments in the next step), but realize that the flavor will get *stronger* with the following step, so don't over-do it.
Heat up the griddle to ~ 350 F and let it get hot enough that water dances off the top (similar to cooking pancakes). Add bacon grease or your preferred cooking oil, and then drop your meat/pepper/onion mixture onto the skillet to sear - use a slotted tool to leave the broth mostly behind, or you'll probably make a mess with all the splattering. The goal here is to char the ends of the meat very slightly and re-heat the mixture all at the same time. The key is not to overwhelm the skillet by covering it all up and cooling it off. It should stay HOT and cook pretty quickly. Using a spatula, flip it every 30 seconds or so. Pro tip: take some of the broth and any extra bacon grease you may have, and drizzle it over the meat while cooking in this step. What you are doing is boiling off the water, concentrating the flavor while caramelizing the veggies in the mixture. If you are using a regular skillet, or a griddle with a catch pan, you can drain the leftover liquids on top of the meat in the serving dish!
Heap your carnitas mixture into a serving dish as you are cooking it. I actually did this entire process an hour before the party get confident that it was going to be tasty, and then re-heated the food on the skillet in front of everyone as they arrived. This is a fun process, and it's sort of dramatic so folks get a kick out of watching it happen
For garnish/side items, we used lettuce, chopped cilantro, guacamole, and I cooked another couple of onions separately on the skillet since you really can't have enough of those.
I encourage you to try the cheese dip on top of the tacos themselves. There wasn't a single person who tried this and didn't like them. Some folks also used the meat with tortilla chips to make themselves nachos, which I heard were great. Because this recipe makes GREAT leftovers due to the veggies mixed with the meat to hold moisture, I suggest you over-estimate the meat requirement if you have some big eaters coming. Worst case, you have a killer meal the next day as well. Same comment goes for the cheese dip.
