me make food

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Actually I am brining the pork chops. They were still a bit frozen so brining helped thaw them too.

So why brine? Well pork these days are really lean. Brining will help lock the moisture in the pork. I am sure you would rather have a juicy chop over the dried and tough one.

This comes from Alton Brown on good eats.
pork chop episode part 1
pork chop episode part 2

The brine (for about 5 chops)
# 3/4 cup kosher salt (DO NOT use regular white table salt!)
# 1 cup brown sugar
# 1 tablespoon black peppercorns
# 1 tablespoon mustard powder (do not use prepared mustard!)
# 2 cups cider vinegar (heated until hot)
# 1 lb ice cubes

We are only having 2 chops so I chopped (tee he he) the brine in 1/2 and left stuff out. Was pretty much just salt and sugar.

Garlic Bread

Softened butter, garlic salt, granulated garlic, parsley, and parmesan cheese. I should of used fresh garlic, but I forgot because it has been a while. Cooked in toaster oven on 400 for a few minutes. I made the video below of it a while back. It is before we remodeled the kitchen and the old toaster oven.

Pan fried taters

Pretty simple. I slice them decently thick, put some oil and clarified butter in a non stick pan set to medium. When they get close to done I salt, pepper, and add greek seasoning.

Grillin

I get my grill rocket hot and those chops cook quick as heck. Some Misty’s seasoning works great for chops. Turn them 90 degrees to get the pretty marks, flip and a few minutes more and they are good to go.

Great meal with not too much work from stuff we just had around. No clue what to make tonight though.

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Take a chicken bewb or two and smash them down to an even thickness between some cling wrap. You can moisten the inside and outside of the cling wrap with water to make it less sticky. it really seems to help.

Use the flat side of your smashy thing and not the toothed side. You do not want a puddle of destroyed chicken goop. You want a slightly smooshed and even thickness bewb. It is still going to rip the meat a bit, but not too bad. It does not need to be really thin, just evenly thick. You could use a can of food to do this, but use one with a smoothish bottom cuz one with a ring will hurt it bad.

schmashed good

These are the spices I used to make a cajun seasoning. I know there is cajun seasoning as one of my spices, but I still for some reason feel the need to add some single spices in there to make me happy that I am in control of this situation. Be careful with the cayenne though.

Coat the smooshed bewb with your seasoning really well. This is what is going to flavor the whole dish and the cream and the cheese are going to fight the spice and try to make it all dull so spice up that bewb good.

Put a pan on medium heat and let it get hot. I like to use stainless pans because I am going to be wisking it and it sure does look pretty. If you want to test how hot the pan is fling some water from your fingers and wait for a sizzle. After it is hot pour a bit of olive oil or cooking oil in there. You prob do not want to waste good olive oil Like I am doing in the above pic, but I like to live on the wild side. Just enough oil to coat the bottom of the pan. We are not deep frying. The oil should heat up pretty quick so go grab that bewb.

We are not trying to blacken this, just cook it. Burnt spices really do not taste good so monitor your heat. I end up going a bit below medium. If it is smoking you are way too hot. Check for doneness on the first side and flip once. Might need to add a bit more oil and the oil is going to absorb some of the spice and change colors. The 2nd side should cook pretty quick.

Once done pull off and let rest. I like to put it on a piece of foil I have crinkled up so it can drain the juices. I seal it and let it carryover while I work on the rest of the meal. You will slice it later and maybe find out that it is not all the way cooked. That is fine because it will be going back into the sauce when it is cut up and it will finish up no prob.

Pull the pan off the heat so the goodness does not burn off and cut up some garlic and sun dried tomatoes.

If your pan is still hot keep it off the burner and add the garlic and SD tomatoes to the pan. Might need to add a touch more oil. Scrape them around on all the golden fond in the bottom of the pan and lightly cook for a minute or two. We are talking med low or lower if you put it back on the burner. Burnt garlic and burning all the seasoning leavings is going to ruin the whole meal. The SD tomato and garlic will prob get coated in all the fond in the pan and look gross, but do not worry.

Now we are going to add some white wine to add flavor and get all the goodness out of the crap in the pan. You pan should not be hot so you do not need to worry about this steaming all over. Add enough to cover the stuff and then let this simmer down and reduce on close to medium heat for a few minutes.

How about we cut up some tomatoes for a pretty garnish. Are the necessary? Nope, but they look good.

For some reason I forgot to get a pic of my cut up chicken. grrrr… Oh well, cut it up how you want. I go for bite size pieces. If there are juices in the foil or plate make sure to add that back into the sauce. it is magical dripping I tell ya.

Add some heavy whipping cream to your reduced sauce and stir it around.

this would be a good time to boil the pasta of your choice.

Throw that chicken in the pan now and simmer close to medium to reduce that sauce. Unfortunately this is the part you just need to learn by doing it. Getting the sauce to the right thickness is a bit tough. The warmer it is the runnier it is going to be. By the time it is on the pasta and plate it will thicken up. Oh and you still have to add the cheese which will thicken it up more. if it seems thick in the pan add some more cream, stir, and pull.

Shred some parmesan cheese very fine. I use a microplane which makes the smallest little slivers of instant melt cheese.

Get that cheese in there and make sure you have a bit left over as garnish. it just looks nice darnit. Stir it up and melt it. Now is the time to decide if it is thick enough. You could let it simmer some more, but not too hot because the cheese might mess up on ya. You could throw the pasta in there too, or just pour over pasta.

Garnish and enjoy.

I hope you were not looking for a recipe with measurements and the like. I do not roll that way. Cooking from a recipe is important in baking, but experimenting it by doing it and tasting along the way is going to help you so much more than any recipe will for cooking. Plus I do not know how many people you are going to be feeding or how hungry you are. Hope you enjoy it if you try to make it. maybe put a spin on it and use shrimp or something.

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