If Air Canada and the weather cooperate, tomorrow I'll be flying from Vancouver to my hometown in Ontario, visiting with my parents for a short and sweet pre-Christmas stay. I'm rushing around today trying my hand at candy making (!!!) and baking some favorites so that I don't arrive empty-handed on my parent's doorstep. Before I leave my poor husband alone with his probable weekend diet of hotdogs and fried eggs, I'm sure that something nice and homey for dinner would be very much appreciated. Last night while I perused my usual web haunts, I stumbled upon Joe's recipe for Mustard & Maple Pork Tenderloin. I made a couple modifications, but it was such an easy recipe to put together and the pork came out so tender, juicy and flavourful, that this dish will definitely be made again and again. The best part of this dish? The leftovers! Today's lunch was some leftover pork sliced extra thin and served between 2 slices of thick sourdough bread topped with homemade pickles. Yum!
mustard & maple pork tenderloin
2 T Dijon mustard, divided
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
16 ounces trimmed pork tenderloin
1 t canola oil
2 T cider vinegar
2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
1. Preheat oven to 425
2. Take 1 T of dijon and spread it over the tenderloin, making sure it's all covered with the mustard. In a large cast iron skillet, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add pork and brown all sides evenly. When evenly browned, move pan into the oven and cook for about 20 minutes. Remove tenderloin from the oven, transfer to a plate, and let it rest before slicing.
3. While pork is resting, add the vinegar, maple syrup and remaining mustard to the skillet. Cook over medium heat while scraping all the brown bits from the bottom into the sauce. Add any juice from the pork into the sauce. Bring to a boil and reduce until thickened.
4. Slice tenderloin and pour over sauce.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
a saucy little meal
a saucy little meal
If Air Canada and the weather cooperate, tomorrow I'll be flying from Vancouver to my hometown in Ontario, visiting with my parents for a short and sweet pre-Christmas stay. I'm rushing around today trying my hand at candy making (!!!) and baking some favorites so that I don't arrive empty-handed on my parent's doorstep. Before I leave my poor husband alone with his probable weekend diet of hotdogs and fried eggs, I'm sure that something nice and homey for dinner would be very much appreciated. Last night while I perused my usual web haunts, I stumbled upon Joe's recipe for Mustard & Maple Pork Tenderloin. I made a couple modifications, but it was such an easy recipe to put together and the pork came out so tender, juicy and flavourful, that this dish will definitely be made again and again. The best part of this dish? The leftovers! Today's lunch was some leftover pork sliced extra thin and served between 2 slices of thick sourdough bread topped with homemade pickles. Yum!
mustard & maple pork tenderloin
2 T Dijon mustard, divided
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
16 ounces trimmed pork tenderloin
1 t canola oil
2 T cider vinegar
2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
1. Preheat oven to 425
2. Take 1 T of dijon and spread it over the tenderloin, making sure it's all covered with the mustard. In a large cast iron skillet, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add pork and brown all sides evenly. When evenly browned, move pan into the oven and cook for about 20 minutes. Remove tenderloin from the oven, transfer to a plate, and let it rest before slicing.
3. While pork is resting, add the vinegar, maple syrup and remaining mustard to the skillet. Cook over medium heat while scraping all the brown bits from the bottom into the sauce. Add any juice from the pork into the sauce. Bring to a boil and reduce until thickened.
4. Slice tenderloin and pour over sauce.
Sunday, August 13, 2006
peachy keen
Our week-long camping trip was wonderful! We canoed on Slocan Lake, wandered around historic Greenwood, and dreamily made plans for the future. Ahhhh, I love summer roadtrips and get-aways! The food was amazing as well. The vegetarian cashew chili I prepared the first night was delicious and the left-overs made an amazing burrito dinner the second evening. Over the course of the week, we had amazing barbequed corn on the cob, roasted potatoes, delicious nectarines, and the best sandwiches from the Frog Mountain Cafe in Cresent Valley. Yum!
Back in Vancouver, I made sure to start our return to civilization on the right foot with a freshly baked batch of peach and vanilla scones for breakfast. The turned out deliciously and were great served with cold butter and a bit of cinnamon honey from the Okanagan. To carry on with the peach theme, dinner was a super-tender pork tenderloin roasted with peaches and ginger. As much as I love travelling, I sure do enjoy the comforts of home!
1 c white flour
1 c whole wheat flour
1 T baking powder
1/4 t salt
2 T sugar
1/3 c chilled butter, diced
2 t vanilla extract
1/2 c vanilla yogurt
2 T milk
1 peach, diced
1. Preheat oven to 425 F.
2. In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar. Add the butter. With your hands, combine the flour and butter together until mixture is crumbly and the butter pieces are no larger than peas.
3. Add the vanilla extract, yogurt, milk and peaches and stir into the flour mixture with a wooden spoon. When the mixture comes together, knead the dough a few times, and then flatten dough into a disc about half an inch thick. Cut into 8 pieces, place on a cookie sheet. Bake for 10-15 minutes, or until golden. Cool on a wire rack.
1 pork tenderloin
salt & pepper
1 t olive oil
2 peaches, diced
1 red onion, diced
2 T chopped ginger
1 T chopped garlic
1 t molasses
1 T soy sauce
1 t hot sauce
juice of half a lemon
1. Heat oven to 450 F.
2. Sprinkle salt & pepper over the pork tenderloin. The secret to a tender roast is to sear the meat, so this step is very important! In a heavy cast iron pot, heat the olive oil and sear the meat on all sides. Turn off heat.
3. Add the peaches and onion to the pot. Pour the remaining ingredients over top and mix with a wooden spoon. Cover the pot and place into hot oven for about 30 minutes or so. Remove lid and continue cooking for another 15 minutes before removing from oven. Slice and serve.
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
southern hospitality
Last night I felt inspired enough to make an entire meal with drinks, a main course, a couple of sides and a dessert. It even had a Southern theme! Unfortunately, my camera died before I could take a photo of everything plated, but rest assured, it was a sight to behold. Truely.
The first undertaking was drinks and since it was a southern meal, I decided to make some lemon iced tea. I don't like to add a lot of sugar, so please adjust to your own taste buds.
lemon ice tea
- I set my kettle to boil
- put 2 orange pekoe tea bags in my pitcher
- added the juice of 2 lemons and the hollowed out lemon carcasses (for extra lemony flavour, dontcha know)
- dumped in a 1/4 c of white sugar and poured the boiling water over the whole lot. I topped up the pitcher with cold water and stirred everything around. When the tea bags had finished their steep, I removed them from the pitcher and just let the mixture cool on the counter before refrigerating
With my drinks taken care of, I was onto part two of this southern feast:
pulled pork sandwiches
I didn't really know what I was doing since I came up with this one on the fly, but it turned out nicely. Cornelius commented that this tasted like real barbeque, so I think I did good.
I took a pork loin and marinated it with a lot of crushed garlic, some chipotle powder, cumin, mexican chili powder, dried thyme and a bit of salt. After a couple hours of fridge-sitting, I popped the entire thing into a small covered roasting pan and into the oven for about an hour at 450 degrees. I then mixed together some ketchup, yellow mustard, honey, brown sugar, worchestershire sauce, cider vinegar and some xxx hot sauce and poured it over the pork. I dropped the oven temperature to 350 degrees and cooked it for half an hour before taking it out of the oven and shredding it all together into one big shredded porky mess of tasty goodness. Back in the oven for another half hour before we served this on whole wheat hot dogs buns (seriously, it was all we had & the meal didn't suffer from it one bit).
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I figured a potato salad was in order and I wanted something nice and light tasting. I had bought a whole wack of lemons (14 for $2) earlier in the day, so I figured I'd make up a lemon vinegrette and see what would come of that. The results? So fresh and tasty that the world "incredible" came up more than once.incredible lemony potato salad
6 small yukon gold potatoes in their skins
2 stalks of celery with leaves, diced and leaves roughly chopped
1 large lemon, juiced and zested
1/4 c olive oil
1 t honey (or white sugar, if vegan)
1 t dijon mustard
1 small bunch of basil, torn
1 T capers
pepper and rock salt
1. Boil potatoes whole in their skins until done. Cool slightly and cut into large cubes. Place in bowl. Add chopped celery.
2. Mix together lemon juice, olive oil, honey and dijon into a dressing and pour over potatoes.
3. Tear basil leaves over top of salad. Add capers, lemon zest, freshly ground pepper and rock salt. Mix. Cool in fridge until ready to serve.
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I've posted this recipe before, but it's so good that I have to post it again. An Everybody Likes Sandwiches first. It's that good. Actually, this time I used less lemons (last time I used 2), but even with just 1 fat lemon it was all good. It's the perfect snack or side dish for hot weather because these beans are eaten icy cold so it's the perfect foil for the heat of summertime.Lemony-Garlicy Green Beans
1 lb of fresh green beans, trimmed
2 cloves of garlic, minced (1 clove if you aren't among friends)
1 fat lemon, juiced
2-3 T of olive oil
rock salt
1. Steam the green beans until bright green and crisp. You don't want to over cook these. Crisp = delicous! Drain and rinse in cold-cold water. At this point, I put the beans in the freezer just to get extra cold while I mixed the dressing.
2. For the dressing, mix the garlic, lemon juice and olive oil together. Transfer beans into a nice serving dish and pour dressing over top. Return to the fridge for extra coldness. Sprinkle generously with rock salt and serve. It's better than chips. Seriously.
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Okay, I lied about making dessert. I was fully planning on making a rhubarb and strawberry cobbler but after such a feast, Cornelius and I decided that adding dessert would be way too much. So we played board games and sipped homemade ice tea instead. I think we made the smart choice. The rhubarb can wait another day.
