The lovely Kate Hill and Diva have invited us to savour our four legged oinking friend and cook him up in honour of San Antonio Abate’s feast day which falls on January the 17th. Who am I to argue about that?

Whilst there will be many amazing feats of chauterie coming from my fellow floggers, I have no idea where to start in that area, but I do like to eat the end products mmmmm. So I decided instead that I would showcase a simple, yet excedingly tasty meal that will enable you all to eat and thourougly enjoy your pork. I give you garlic pork chops with a fresh borlotti bean salad.
Borlotti beans are in season in Australia at the moment and I implore you to give this beautiful, humble bean a chance.

Garlic Pork Chops
1 Pork Chop per person (2 if you are real big eaters)
a few cloves of fresh garlic minced
salt and pepper

Preheat a griddle pan on medium heat until it is really hot. Meanwhile, massage the garlic cloves and alittle salt and pepper into each side of your pork chop. Leave to marinate. When the pan is really hot, cook the pork chops on the grill pan.

** alittle tip: lay the chop down, once the side has sealed lift it up again and lay it down in the same spot. That will prevent the chop from sticking. To have the moistest pork chop, don’t overcook it or flip flop it around. Wait til the blood comes to the top of the chop to turn it, then drizzle a drop of olive oil onto the cooked side. ***

Borlotti Bean Salad
A handful of Borlotti bean pods per person.
half a fennel
half a red onion
a couple of garlic cloves
1 small chilli
a big handful of parsley leaves
olive oil and lemon juice
salt and pepper

Bring a pot of water to the boil, whilst you are waiting for the water to boil pod the borlotti beans. When the water is boiling add the beans and bring back to the boil and cook til the beans are tender. This should take around 5 to 7 minutes depending on beans, pot size etc. Be careful not to over cook the beans.

While the beans are boiling: finely dice the fennel and red onion and mince the garlic and chilli. Put these into a bowl with salt and pepper and some olive oil. When the beans are ready drain them and put the drained beans into the bowl. Toss. Add lemon juice to taste and a big hadful od chopped parsley leaves when cooled.

Serving suggestion: a pork chop a big spoonful of the Borlotti bean salad and a piece of bread that has been grilled on the griddle pan which has been rubbed with garlic and drizzled with olive oil.
Enjoy!

This entry was posted on Monday, January 16th, 2006 at 1:14 am and is filed under Recipes, Food Blog Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.