Instant Pot- Carnitas w pics

I got my new Instant Pot in last week from Prime Day. I had some frozen pork shoulder but in the freezer so I gave carnitas a shot yesterday. The cooker is so easy to use and the finished product was great. I love the saute function which allowed me to brown the meat, cook down the veggies and reduce the sauce in the end all in the same pot. I'm no carnitas authority but here is what I did.

Cut the pork shoulder in squares. Covered with some olive oil, cumin, oregano and cayenne and let it marinate for a couple hours in a ziplock in the fridge.



Fired up the Instant Pot on Saute mode and browned the pork.



Took out pork, added veggies. Onion, jalapeno and towards the end some garlic cloves.



Once cooked down, added the pork back. I squeezed and orange and added the juice. Then I added chicken broth to almost cover everything. I added some black pepper and some red pepper flakes. I sealed the cooker and cooked it for 1 hour. After releasing the pressure, here is how it looked after 1 hour.



I took the pork out and shredded.


I put the saute mode back on to reduce the gravy and I used an immersion blender on it to make it smooth.



The gravy came out so good with the jalapeno and garlic cooked down in that pork fat. You can finish the carnitas off in a frying pan or under the broil setting in the oven to brown them some. Turned out great and very flavorful with a fraction of the cook time. I'm going to do some red beans in the Instant Pot today and will report back on how they come out.