po'kchop po'kchop greasay greasay.......

we think yo (fill in the blank)'s E-ZZZY E-ZZZY


The above chant is all the more reason why children should be home schooled. I learned that in first grade.... and we put "mama" in the blank.

But for real I just figured out WHY a first grader should not be singing it. Innocent mind...... hmm hm hmm...... where's that halo....

No really, I'm just blonde.

Now.... much, much later.... I sing it every time we have pork chops. Bradley even quit looking at me weird, he is use to it.

This is a very easy yet VERY scrumptious Giada recipe that I discovered a while back and we have it a lot for dinner. Might I add, you want to shallow fry in evoo. Your canola oils and veggie oils collect under the crust and that is just no fun at all. Evoo gives you a drier fry.

I made that up, but it's true!

Giada's pork chop recipe can be found HERE and it is tried and true! I usually buy butterflied pork chops and then finish splitting them, but any ol' chop will do!

What I really wanted to talk to you about was my new favorite side dish. Grits! They're not just for breakfast people. You can mix anything in there. Treat them like you would mashed potatoes. Wanna mix in corn, cumin, cilantro and a lil lime juice? You can. Wanna mix in cheese and bacon? You can. Wanna mix in sardines and anchovies? You can, I won't judge you.

I won't come near you..... but I won't judge you.

For this meal, I added in mozzarella cheese. Some halved cherry tomatoes and parsley would of been great mixed in, but you know what? I'm married and that's chick food. So... there you go.

My other side dish was canned asparagus (love!) tossed with lemon juice, minced garlic, salt and fresh ground black pepper. This, apparently, is not chick food.

Take note.

Vinegar: It's what's for dinner!

Sort of! As I mentioned in the last post, warm weather means you can find the two of us by the grill - chatting while dinner slowly cooks. It is a great way to catch up and wind down after a long day at work.

One of my favorite things for Bradley to grill are porkchops. Bradley has become very open minded in his eating, but he still won't let me mess with what he grills. It is "his territory". That's fine! But this marinade is so simple and so delicious that I don't see why anyone wouldn't want to try it!

Balsamic Blast Marinade for Chicken and Pork
recipe by me

Balsamic Vinegar
Course ground dijon mustard

mix equal parts and whisk together until mixture is soupy. pour over your meat and let it marinate for at least 30 minutes. cook however you like, but i grilled mine :)

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A halloween dinner... that wasn't spooky at all!

We broke the 2 year running streak of grilling steaks on Halloween night! We also only had 3 trick-or-treat-ers. Weird. Maybe the smell of steak was what lured them to our house in the first place...

This year I made Tyler Florence's Smothered Pork Chops. The recipe below has been halved, and I used a thick boneless chop instead of bone in, and the cooking times he lists are FLAWED. My suggestion so you don't end up with lumpy gravy.... let the pork chops cook completely before you take them out to make the gravy. It takes more than 3 minutes per side!

Smothered Pork Chops
recipe by Tyler Florence

1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon onion powder
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon cayenne (i used ground red pepper)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 pork chops, 3/4-inch thick, bone-in (i used a thicker cut that was boneless)
1/4 cup olive oil (i just drizzled enough to coat my pan)
1/2 cup chicken broth (although I ended up using almost the whole can)
1/4 cup buttermilk

Put the flour in a shallow platter and add the onion powder, garlic powder, cayenne, salt, and pepper; mix with a fork to distribute evenly. Pat the pork chops dry with paper towels to remove any moisture and then dredge them in the seasoned flour; shaking off the excess.

Heat a large saute pan or cast iron skillet over medium heat and coat with the oil. When the oil is nice and hot, lay the pork chops in the pan in a single layer and fry for 3 minutes on each side until golden brown. Remove the pork chops from the pan and add a little sprinkle of seasoned flour to the pan drippings. (I used about 3 big spoonfuls) Mix the flour into the fat to dissolve and then pour in the chicken broth in. Let the liquid cook down for 5 minutes to reduce and thicken slightly. Stir in the buttermilk to make a creamy gravy and return the pork chops to the pan, covering them with the sauce. Simmer for 5 minutes until the pork is cooked through. Season with salt and pepper and garnish with chopped parsley before serving.

~~~~~

These were VERY good and VERY spicy! I should not of halved the gravy recipe, it was SO good! I think this would be a good meal to use any sort of meat with. I plan to try it out with cube steaks, soon.

3 of his favorites meet at last!

Recently Bradley expressed his love for smoked gouda to me, to which I said, "where did you hear that word?". I knew I have never cooked anything with gouda for him before, but maybe I needed to. I had made a sort of "inverted chicken parmesan" before by stuffing a chicken breast with gouda and then breading and pan frying it, but it required some intense effort. I finally decided to just combine two of his loves - smoked gouda and bacon - and stuff them inside another one of his loves - a top loin pork chop.

DeLa's "Apparently my Husband Loves Gouda" Stuffed Pork Chops
recipe courtesy of his cravings

2 extra thick top loin pork chops
4 strips of bacon
2-3 ounces of smoked gouda
1/8 teaspoon of parsley
Alessi Dipping Spices

To prepare the stuffing -
fry the bacon, but do not toss out the grease, leave it in the pan. dice the gouda up into small pieces, crumble the bacon and mix both together with the parsley.

To prepare the chops for stuffing -
i found that my boning knife worked really well. the trick is to keep the insertion point small and swing wide with the knife, cutting out the pocket so the stuffing will go almost to the edge, that way you won't have overcooked thin areas and undercooked thick areas.

Stuff the chops with the stuffing. I then added just a little of the dipping spices to the outside of the meat, mainly for color. Presentation is very important. Take tongs and hold the chop insertion side down and stick it to the hot pan full of bacon grease (we're so healthy). This will sear the opening and help keep the stuffing where it belongs. I rolled it in the pan so all the edges were seared, then set it in the grease. Do the same with the other one, and let them both cook about 5-7 minutes per side.

The bacon grease turns the outside of the meat into a crust almost, it cooked them SO nicely and really added an incredible element of flavor. And the stuffing..... WOW! It definately got the "sit back in the chair and moan with delight" approval from Bradley. In fact, he did it with almost every bite.

Since the main course was not so healthy, I tried to counter it with the side dish. We both ate couscous for the first time. I described it to him as "not quite grits but not quite rice" so for the rest of the meal he asked for more "grice". It was original flavor, so I added some freshly grated parmesan to the top to make it a little more tasty. I really think it is one of my new favorite sides. The grocery store where I bought it only had original flavor, I'm going to make an effort to go to a bigger grocery and buy different flavors.