A simple recipe for delicious Crockpot Pork Carnitas! This Mexican classic comes together in no time using flavorful pork butt, spices, onion, oranges, and beer! With a special trick to get your carnitas tasting better than what you get at a restaurant! Perfect for filling tacos, burritos, quesadillas, and more!
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Let’s Make Easy Pork Carnitas in the Slow Cooker
The best recipes in my opinion are ones that are simple to make, delicious, and can be stretched into multiple meals AND THIS ONE DOES IT ALL!
These Crockpot Carnitas are:
- Easy to make. Basically a dump and go slow cooker recipe!
- Super flavorful, a recipe the WHOLE FAMILY will devour.
- It is a large recipe that keeps really well so it is perfect for stretching into multiple meals!
I love these Carnitas so much in fact that I am working on a whole recipe series of what to make with your Leftover Carnitas!

What you need to make Easy Crockpot Carnitas:
Equipment you need:
- Slow Cooker/Crockpot
- Standard Kitchen Tools (Cutting Board, Knife, Fork, Measuring Spoons)
- Oven
- Sheet Pan/Tray
Ingredients you need:
- Pork Butt: Around 4 pounds & preferably boneless, also called a Boston Butt. It is actually the cut of pork that comes from the upper part of the front shoulder. It is the cut of pork typically used for making pulled pork.
- Onion: Diced, a sweet, yellow, or white variety will work.
- Spices: Chipotle Chili Powder, Dried Oregano, Cumin, and Salt. NOTE: The Chipotle Chili Powder is different from just normal Chili powder, most big brands like McCormick Spices do carry the Chipotle variety, known to be more smoky and slightly more subtle.
- Orange: Just 1 orange, a navel variety works best but any standard size orange will work. You will be using the zest and the juice.
- Blue Moon Beer: Or similar beer, Blue Moon is a Belgian-style Witbier AKA a Wheat Ale, so look for something similar if you can’t find Blue Moon. You will just need one bottle for this recipe.

How to make Crockpot Carnitas Recipe:
Carefully cut the pork butt into 4 even pieces. Leave any fat pieces on, this adds to the flavor and the fat can be picked off when it is time to pull the pork. I cut the pork but into pieces to allow more flavor soak into the meat.
Transfer pork pieces to the crock. Add the diced onion, chipotle chili powder, oregano, cumin, and salt over top pork.
Zest entire orange over top the spices and juice the entire orange into the crockpot.

Now slowly pour the beer overtop the crockpot contents.

Cover the crockpot and set to LOW for 6 to 8 hours or HIGH for 4 hours. Cooking times will vary depending on size of meat and equipment used.

Once the pork is done in the crockpot (able to be easily pulled apart) there is one last step that is a game changer for making these carnitas better than a restaurant. You will shred the pork and then it will be crisped up in the oven.
So set your oven to BROIL. Transfer all the pork to a sheet pan. Pull/shread pork apart and spread over the entire sheet pan.
Measure out about 1/4 cup of the liquid from the crockpot and sprinkle evenly over the pulled pork.
Transfer to the middle rack of the oven and broil 5 to 6 minutes until the pork gets nice and crispy edges.
Serve immediately. Suggested serving, for delicious tacos serve with warm tortillas, queso fresco cheese, cilantro, and red onions.



If you like this recipe you might like:
- Slow Cooker Chipotle Pineapple Carnitas
- Crockpot Rotisserie Chicken
- Crockpot Clean Eating BBQ Pulled Chicken
- Slow Cooker Chicken Shawarma
- Crockpot Bolognese
Have Leftover Carnitas?? Here are some great recipe ideas on how to use up those leftovers:
Need Chipotle Chili Powder? Order some here:
Crockpot Carnitas

A simple recipe for delicious Crockpot Pork Carnitas! This Mexican classic comes together in no time using flavorful pork butt, spices, onion, oranges, and blue moon beer! With a special trick to get your carnitas tasting better than what you get at a restaurant! Perfect for filling tacos, burritos, quesadillas, and more!
Ingredients
- 4 pounds pork butt
- 1 onion, diced
- 1 tablespoon chipotle chili powder
- 2 teaspoons oregano
- 2 teaspoons cumin
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 large orange
- 1 (12oz) Blue Moon or similar wheat beer
Instructions
- Carefully cut pork butt into 4 even pieces. Transfer pork pieces to the crock. Add onion, chipolte chili powder, oregano, cumin, and salt over top pork. Zest entire orange over top the spices and juice the entire orange into the crockpot. Slowly pour the beer overtop the crockpot contents. Cover the crockpot and set to LOW for 7 to 8 hours or HIGH for 4 hours.
- Set oven to BROIL. Once pork is done (able to be easily pulled apart) transfer all the pork to a sheet pan. Pull pork apart and spread over the entire sheet pan. Measure out about 1/4 cup of liquid from the crockpot and sprinkle evenly over the pulled pork. Transfer to the middle rack of the oven and broil 5 to 6 minutes until the pork gets nice and crispy edges.
- Serve immediately. Suggested serving, for delicious tacos serve with warm tortillas, queso fresco cheese, cilantro, and red onions.
Notes
Chipotle Chili Powder is different than plain Chili Powder, use Chipotle Chili Powder in this recipe.
If you skip broiling in the oven I do find that the carnitas are really wet and mushy which isn't great, so don't skip the broiling step!
While I highly suggest beer for this recipe, if you don't have beer in your house you can use broth instead.
The Pork Butt cut is also referred to as a Boston Butt, they are the same thing. This cut of meat sometimes will contain a bone, I recommend a boneless cut.
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Nutrition Information:
Yield:
8Serving Size:
1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 632Total Fat: 43gSaturated Fat: 16gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 23gCholesterol: 195mgSodium: 447mgCarbohydrates: 5gFiber: 1gSugar: 3gProtein: 53g
Nutritional data is automated, final nutritional information will depend on ingredients used and any changes made.
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Lauren, The Schmidty Wife
Nachos for leftovers are great with this recipe.
I totally agree!
First time making carnitas and they turned out perfect! Recipe was super simple and didn’t require much prep. I was a little hesitant about the cumin being spicy but it was not. Also, love the Chipotle chili powder. I will be adding it to more dished as I love the extra smokey flavor.
Would a whole chicken work?
No sorry, but if you are looking to make a whole chicken you could try making this instead: https://theschmidtywife.com/crockpot-rotisserie-chicken/
Could I combine the ingredients the night before, store them in the refrigerator overnight, and then start them in the crockpot the next morning?
Yes! Absolutely you can do that!
Would a non alcoholic beer work?
Yes a non-alcoholic beer will work!
Could I use this recipe to cook a cut or beef, like roast, instead of pork? My husband loves Blue Moon and I have roast in the freezer.
It is worth a try, I think it would probably be pretty good. If you try it please let me know how it turns out.
Tasted little plain but over not bad
Loved this recipe! I added garlic powder 1 teaspoon. Then about 2 hours before it was done added 1/3 cup of brown sugar. It added just a little bit of sweet with the savory! I made tacos last night and they were excellent. Making Nachos later this week.
Do you think I could cram 8 pounds into one crockpot and double the recipe or should I go borrow another crockpot to make double?
If it is easy for you to borrow one I would recommend doing that. But if you are able to manage to fit all 8 pounds I think the recipe would stil work, you will definitely want to watch the cooking time because it will be longer, unfortunately I can’t tell you exactly how much longer since I haven’t tried doubling it before. I hope that helps.
What the Temp. SET FOR THE Broiler
High Broiler level
Can you do this in an instant pot?
You could! I will say I have not tried it so I couldn’t tell you what the timing should be exactly. If I were to try I would say you want to cut the meat into smaller pieces than just 4 chunks, 8 would probably fit better and then you would want to cook probably 30 minutes followed by a natural release. Let me know if you try it!