I shot Ben an e-mail just before a meeting today with my Palm Pre Plus, realizing I had forgotten to do something before I left.  I wrote, “I forgot to make a marinade for dinner this morning, could you help me, please?  You just need to make the marinade, and I’ll grill it later? Pleaseeeee?”

I could hear the sense of urgency and panic in his e-mailed response: ” What?!  How do I do that??? ” 

Here was my response:

 ”-Take the pork chops- rinse each, and paper towel dry.  Put in the bag.   Squeeze as much air out as possible, then put in fridge on a plate.

Mix in a bowl:

• -Juice and zest from one lemon (make sure not to zest the white part, just the yellow-yellow tastes lemony, white tastes bitter)
• -2 tablespoons olive oil
• -4 cloves garlic, chopped small 
• -1 teaspoon salt
• -small handful/couple tablespoons chopped up rosemary
• -cracked pepper/cracked salt- be generous, but don’t overdo it
• Whisk with a whisk, pour into a big freezer bag.  Roll around so all the chops are coated with the marinade.  Stick the bag in the fridge on a plate.  I’ll take care of the rest

I’ve got to admit, I had total faith in him from the get-go, but I knew he was a bit scared.  Zesting and chopping garlic I think were the most difficult of the whole dish, but he whizzed through (and, very much impressed me I might add) by remembering that we have the Chef’n Garlic Zoom and the Chef’n Zester.

When I got home, waiting for me in the fridge, was a beautiful bag of marinated pork chops. 

I fired up the grill, and once nice and hot, I gave one final sprinkle of salt and pepper, and put them on the grill rack.  I let it cook till just barely done (gorgeous color, juices run clear, not overdone though), set on the counter for 10 or 15 minutes (so that the juices have a chance to redistribute before slicing in), and then enjoyed this AMAZING pork chop.

This recipe make 3 decent sized pork chops, but didn’t make a huge amount of marinade, so that there wasn’t a lot of waste.  I have wasted a LOT of Italian dressing in my marinading days, so trust me, the less you can use without wasting, the better.

Enjoy your delicious, juicy, tangy, flavorful pork!!!

..so wait.  What’s the trick that makes this recipe so labor-less?

Why, having someone else make it for you, of course!

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Why, you make cinnamon lentil soup!

First, I softened 1 Farmer’s Market Leek  (cut like this) and 2 cloves of garlic in 2 tablespoons of butter and 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Stir in 2-3 tablespoons of curry (depends on the level of spicy you like), and 1 teaspoon of cinnamon.  If need be, add small amounts of chicken broth so that it doesn’t burn while you wait for them to soften.

Once softened, pour in one 32 ounce carton of chicken broth or stock, and when it’s boiling, dump in 1/2 of a 1 lb. bag of lentils.  Add more broth/stock or water if it starts to look like the liquid is getting too low.  When they have softened, shred some leftover pork into it, and YUM!  This soup is heavy yet DELICIOUS, and it’s so very warm and wonderful.

Enjoy!

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But this was a very simple – I bought a couple of loins of pork, rinsed, paper towel dried, and rubbed well with cinnamon, salt, and pepper.  I suppose the “correct way” to cook it is to seal in the juices, and put some nice color on it by searing it (like I did in this Roast Pork post), but I didn’t have time.  So I just rubbed it, stuck it in the crockpot and poured a shot or two of white wine in (Pinot Grigio).  I bet laying some apples and onions in here as well would be AWESOME, but again, I just didn’t have time.

I set my crock pot for 4 hours, you could do more or less depending on the timeframe you’re looking for, as well as your crockpot options, size of the loin, etc. 

I know you may wonder why I barely put any liquids, but really you don’t need to put tons; the pork will release it’s own juices, the wine is more for flavor than the “adding liquid” aspect.

This smells so so wonderful when cooking- reminiscent of (sob) fall.

Enjoy with Smashed Fauxtatoes like I do, or some fresh Farmer’s Market -fresh Balsamic Sesame Swiss Chard!

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But once my palate changed over to summer-weather, it was hard for me to go from the grilled taste of foods, back to soups and stews.  So I decided to get out my grill pan, and make a hot-off-the-grill meal inside!

(A grill pan is just a frying pan with the lines in it, that gives your food those beautiful grill marks.)

I took some butterflied pork chops, rinsed, paper-toweled dry, and then seasoned with some Old Bay and pepper. 

Next, depending on your stove, I took my grill pan and, with no oil or anything, got the pan HOT- test between medium high and high, and you’ll know it’s ready when you can toss a few drops of water in the pan and see the immediate sizzle.

Next, put the meat in, I did butterflied side down first. 

There is a tool you can use to “stamp” down the meat for those deep, dark marks, but I use something else instead-a small cake pan and my fist. 

Now, this may not be the way to go as the cake pan could theoretically get very hot and hurt you (mine wasn’t like that long enough to).  I also have used a heavy porcelain ramekin.  Alton Brown from Food Network uses a pan and a brick wrapped in tin foil to weigh the meat down long enough to make the grill marks.  Once side one is “grilled,” flip it over, and repeat the process on the other side.

When you’ve got the nice grill marks, you can either finish it in the pan (add some broth or water to finish poaching the meat), or stick it in the oven to finish cooking through.  I ”stuffed” mine with the Chickpea Salad, served with a side of pineapple (also grilled in the grill pan using the same technique!!) and enjoyed!!!

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There’s a big chain Italian restaurant in this country that has this fabulous Zuppa Toscana.  I tried it, loved it, and made it at home over a year ago (before I learned about eating supportively).  The recipe is delicious, but it calls for a cup of heavy cream, potatoes, and bacon.  Today, I decided, was my day to reinvent Zuppa Toscana.

I had to think of a way to get the color (and the texture) of a cream based soup without the cream, the potatoes chunks without the potatoes, and swap out the regular bacon for turkey bacon (that was easy!)   I wondered if I could swap out the cauliflower for potatoes, and puree some of that cauliflower to make the heavy cream.  So I set out to make that happen. Here’s what I did:

Started out by sautéing up a pound of sweet Italian Sausage (it  calls for spicy, but my kiddo’s have to eat this, and the recipe calls for red pepper flakes as well-I love spice!) (I used 4 Sweet Italian Sausage Patties), with 1 and 1/2 Tsp. of Crushed Red Pepper Flakes in a large soup pot.  Once well browned, remove from heat, take it out of the pot, put it on a plate, and refrigerate until the soup is done.

Browning the Sausage and Red Pepper Flakes

Once that’s in the fridge, take an onion, 2 chopped cloves of garlic, and 4 slices of turkey bacon (torn into strips) and sizzled that till the onions were softened, and the bacon was crisped, about 8-10 minutes. 

Bacon, onion, and garlic, sizzlin' up!

Next, I added two 32 oz. cartons of low-sodium chicken broth, and an entire head of cauliflower, chopped into small pieces, and cooked on high till cauliflower was cooked through and softened, but not mush.

Softened Cauli

Then, I turned off the heat, ladeled about a cup of the cooked cauliflower and put it in the blender.  Make sure not to put the bacon in-the purpose of the blending this smooth is to make the white, sooth puree-like the substitute for the cup of heavy cream! We don’t want to make it pink with the bacon!

I added this puree to the soup, then stirred in a bunch of small, torn, kale leaves.  I scooped some into a bowl, put in a couple of heaping spoonfuls of the prepared sausage, and YUM!!!!  DELICIOUS, ZUPPA TOSCANA!

DELICIOUS, SUPPORTIVE, ZUPPA TOSCANA

This soup is undeniably, unbelievably close to the original Zuppa Toscana from the Italian Chain restaurant. YOU MUST try this soup!!  You won’t believe your tastebuds!

YUM!

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For those of you who don’t know what LOST is about, it’s about a plane that crashes onto an Island somewhere in the South Pacific.  There is SO much more to it, but for this recipe, all you need to know is, it’s got tropical fruits growing on it, and boars that run around all over the place.  The Island’s also got Polar bears and smoke monsters inhabiting it, but I won’t be featuring any of those for this particular recipe : ) 

Island Boar topped with Mango Salsa

First up, I made the Mango Salsa and put it in the fridge to top this ISLAND BEAST!  I fired up the rice cooker for my coconut rice, and made my way to the stove. 

I feel like the tropical flavors from the salsa and the coconut rice should be the stars of the show, so simple prep of the pork chop are key here.  I bought the pork chops (I’m sure this would also be PHENOMENAL atop fish and chicken, too) and got the butterflied kind, so I could fill with the salsa.  I rinsed and paper toweled them, seasoned with salt and pepper, and proceeded to simply pan fry them using my grill pan so that it would leave beautiful marks. 

Once cooked through (but not overcooked-nothing is worse than cardboard pork!!  Well, except maybe overcooked salmon- BLECH!) I plated it, topped it with my beautiful salsa, plated it next to my coconut basmati, and YUM!!! 

Since I’m considering this my cheat meal, and I’m about to get lost in..um..LOST, I guess I’ll go pour myself a glass of dharma wine…and cuddle up next to Jack and/or Sawyer.   Heck, both since this my fantasy : )

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Well, over Christmas, I came down with the most hellacious stomach bug I’ve encountered in a while.  And given that I have children (aka lil’ petri dishes!), I can assure you that it’s suffice to say, I am knowledgable in the art of encountering (and catching) stomach bugs.  I’d even go as far as to say I’m an expert!  And while I’m STOKED about my kids being so awesome about sharing with others, there IS an instance where I’d like them to be greedy…and this is one of those instances : )

Anyway, after two days of barely the ability to stand up, and my babies staring at me wide-eyed for something I would typically make to eat (ie, not the pb and jelly’s that I had been slapping together for them for the previous 2 days since my illness began), I knew I needed something quick, healthy, and easy to make.  The thought of soup appealed to me, and Heaven knows, I needed the calories!

I remembered Kristi’s stew, took a glance at the recipe, and saw that I had only a few of the items.  I sure as heck wasn’t going out in the cold, sick, with 2 small kids to the grocery store to gather ingredients, so here’s what I did:

First, I took about 1 onion (I pre-cut my onions, and put them in a large Tupperware for easy weeknight disposal), chopped, and about a clove of minced garlic, and browned it with some olive oil.  I then put in a pound of ground turkey seasoned with YEP! my favorite, Old Bay.  Once that had browned up nicely, I dumped in a can of chickpeas, a large can of crushed tomatoes (the one I had on hand had onions and garlic in it, too) until that was heated through, then put in some frozen whole green beans that I had taken from my garden this summer.  I stirred them in, put a cover on it, and simmered just a minute or two, until the green beans were a nice vibrant green, and turned the heat off to enjoy. 

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Crockpot Pork

I looooveeee crockpot meat.  It makes the house smell awesome, and very, very little work needs to be done to have awesome tender dinner pretty much waiting for you when you get home.  Also, with crockpots, you can buy a less expensive cut (usually more tough), and you’re left with meat you can cut with a fork.  Economical is GREAT in my book! 

I started with a 2 lb. pork roast (I found it on sale and it was about 3 bucks, AWESOME!), pulled it from the freezer, and didn’t even thaw it first.  I removed it from the packaging, rinsed it, and patted it dry.  This is important because you want to sear the meat, and you want it to all brown evenly, which is accomplished by the most direct contact to the heat source as possible with the meat.  Once thoroughly patted dry, I coated it evenly and completely with Old Bay Seasoning (if you don’t have old bay, you could try celery salt and s&p, or whatever you have on hand).

Now when I say I coated it with OB, I mean COATED.  I’m going to sear the meat so it locks in the juices, and the seasoning  coating creates a nice, evenly browned, and tasty crust on the meat. 

I took some oil, coated the bottom of a large pot, and cranked the heat (between medium heat and high) so it was very hot.  Another purpose of a sear is to brown the outside, so the meat looks nice and appealing. Once I seared it on all sides, I put it into a crock pot and  added about an inch of chicken broth.  You can use pork, beef, veggie stock-whatever you have.  Water and bouillion would work, diluted apple juice, whatever.   I put it in and set it for 8 hours, and went about my day. You know your Crockpot (and your daily schedule) better than I do, so if another length of time would work better for you, do it that way. 

When I got home, knowing there was about an hour before I was going to eat, I shredded the meat up with a fork, added a couple of cups of zukes and summer squash (I chopped and frozen them from the garden this summer), a can of diced tomatoes (I happened to accidentally buy the kind that were flavored with garlic and onions, and they worked really well in this recipe) and stirred.  I let it cook in the crock for about another hour (or until the veggies were done) and enjoyed!

(Oh- I apologize for the picture; I realize it’s a bit on the fuzzy side, but my camera is momentarily on the fritz, so it was taken with my Blackberry!)

Enjoy!  Awesome, supportive, and delicious.  Happy Cyber Monday!!!!!

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Let me start by saying, while this recipe looks very detailed, it’s not that bad at all.  There are seemingly a lot of steps, but my mission is to bring you SPEED and more time to spend with your families, less time prepping food.  This recipe took me less than 10 minutes to prep, and the roast took about 5 minutes to sear, before going into the oven for a while.  And they’re pretty cheap in the grocery store (especially when you score a great sale), so it’s a win-win!

We’ve all seen pork roast in the grocers fridge.  When you buy a pork roast, it looks a lot like this:

Pork Roast, Raw

 Well, that sure is boring!

Annnndddd…….that’s where I come in : )

Let me help you spice it up.  First things first, you’re going to want to heat up the oven to 350.  After that, take some peppercorns (to your taste, enough to cover the top of the roast) and some garlic cloves (I used 4)  (Really, you can use garlic powder and regular black pepper and use it as a rub, if you don’t have peppercorns or whole garlic) and put them on a glass or plastic cutting board like this:

Garlic and Peppercorns, before the Crush

  Once tied up, you need to sear your pork.  I once thought that this was purely for aesthetics, browning the outsides and giving some nice color, but now I know that a good sear locks in the juices of the roast, too.  Over medium high heat, cover the base of a pot or stock pot with EVOO.  The best is grapeseed oil, because it can get really hot without releasing a bunch of smoke, but right when the oil is “wavy” looking and very hot, stick the roast in.  The purpose of the sear is not to cook the whole thing- it’s to quickly cook the outsides and give color, but keep the insides raw.

Here’s what it looked like when it went in for it’s sear:

Pre-Sear Pork with Peppercorns and Garlic Cloves

and once the sear was over on that side, I flipped it:

Seared Side #1

By now your oven has preheated to 350, and you can pop it in and forget about it for a while.  Mine was just under 2 pounds, and took about two hours.  You want it to read 160 degrees internally, on your meat thermometer that you hopefully ran right out and bought when I posted my Sunday Roast Chicken recipe. 

 Enjoy your roast, the one that (hopefully) looks like this:

Roasted Pork Perfection

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