Lunch at the University Club

This past week we had our second luncheon 

of the year 

(please note that the year runs from August to May).

Our speaker was the police chief from the 

Indiana University Police Department, or IUPD,

and he spoke to us about his department

and crime on campus.

It was an informative talk and we all learned

a great deal.

For instance, IU is the only university in the country

that has its own police force.

IU also has its own police academy

and recently welcomed its 1,000th cadet into the program.

But this is still primarily a food blog,

so on to the food.

We started off with a traditional spinach salad

with sliced hard-boiled egg,

mushrooms and redo onion with ranch dressing.

Nice, but I would have preferred a different dressing

for this salad.

We had the choice between 

Fisher Farms sorghum glazed pork loin 

with rice pilaf and haricot vert 

or bowtie pasta sauteed with olive oil, garlic and herbs, 

zucchini, yellow squash, tomatoes and olives.

I chose the pork loin.

It was delicious, moist and tender.

They cooked it perfectly.

I need to figure out the recipe for the glaze.

Dessert was a coconut rice pudding.

Interesting,

sweet and chewy,

but not quite my thing.

But then again, 

I am not a desserts person.

IMU catering did a wonderful job as always

and our speaker was quite delightful.

As I was walking out to my car

I was presented with this lovely view.

It was a good day.

Pork Loin Enchiladas

I had some leftover pork loin from the other night

and wanted to make something different with the leftovers.

Luckily for me,

I had a good resource to turn to:

Rosie Hawthorne's blog,

Kitchens Are Monkey Business.

And what do you know?

She had recently made a pork recipe using

a barbecue sauce that I had sent her.

Sounds like a plan.

I dug around in the pantry and fridge and came up with:

tortillas

mild chiles

onion,

fresh mozzarella

pepper jack cheese

sharp cheddar cheese

Colby jack cheese

pork loin

I shredded the pork loin and added about

three tablespoons Sycamore Falls original style

barbecue sauce.







I sliced some onion and the peppers and sauteed these

with the pork and barbecue sauce.






Then I began assembling the enchiladas.








A line of the meat and onions and peppers

topped by the mixed grated cheeses.



Roll the tortilla and place on the baking tray.






I grated the remaining cheddar cheese on top.



These went under the broiler for a few minutes

until the cheese melted and the top was browned.







Looks and smells delicious.

Top with a bit of sour cream and enjoy.

The Foodie Boyfriend thought this would be even better

with pico de gallo and has already requested this for

his birthday next week.

Thanks for the recipe, Rosie!

Roasted Pork Loin

I found a pork loin on sale at my regular grocery store

and began planning a meal around it.

Search out the sales in the meat case.

Brining lean cuts of pork before cooking is a good way

to keep the meat moist.



For this brine I combined

about 1/4 cup kosher salt

1/4 cup brown sugar

black pepper corns

red chile flakes

1/4 cup cider vinegar

1 tablespoon maple syrup

1 quart water



I heated this in the microwave for five minutes

and then stirred to dissolve the salt and sugar.



Then I added ice cubes and allowed the mixture

to come to room temperature

before placing the meat in the brine solution.

After one hour I removed the meat.

It is important to not let the meat sit in the brine for too long

as the brine will change the texture of the meat.

I laid out a grid of cut carrots and onions in a baking dish.

These acted as a rack to keep the roast up off the bottom of

the baking dish.

I salted and peppered the roast and added

Herbes de Provence and olive oil to the roast before baking

at 350 for about one and a half hours or until

the roast reached 140 degrees.

Cover with foil and allow to rest for ten to fifteen minutes

before carving.

Ready to serve.

Roasted pork loin with honey mustard,

the carrots and onion

and Irish potato puffs.

Very nice.

The Foodie Girls know how to eat.

Lunch at the Scottish Rite

As you may recall, my husband is quite involved with various Masonic bodies. As he currently is an officer in the local Scottish Rite Valley, that means that I also am kept busy with the Ladies' Luncheons. Despite my cold, I had to head out on the road this morning to attend a luncheon at the Scottish Rite Cathedral in Indianapolis. And I even saved you a seat...

I had heard good things about today's menu. Thomas Caterers of Distinction always does a very nice job, though.

Our salads have arrived. The menu card tells us that this is a Salad of Seasonal Greens with Apples, Black Walnuts and Goat Cheese tossed with a Dried Cherry Vinaigrette.

The entree consists of Pecan and Honey Mustard-crusted Pork Tenderloin with a Cinnamon Port Wine Demi (sauce), Vermont White Cheddar Mashed Potatoes, Sugar Snap Peas, and Rolls with Butter.

I have got to find or figure out the recipe for the pork loin and sauce. This was all kinds of good.

Ooh, dessert. Here we have Bananas Foster with Graham Cracker Crumb Base.



I found the Graham Cracker crumb base. I'd say a fair amount of brown sugar was mixed in with the Graham Crackers.

And now, on to the entertainment.





A gentleman from a local florist came to demonstrate how to arrange these beautiful roses.

I learned that the wimpy little angles I was cutting into my flower stems aren't nearly enough. Got it: go big.

We learned that linear arranging is the hot new thing, and that as the roses age, we can extend the life of the blooms by cutting the stems down and rearranging the flowers.

Afterwards, each lady was invited to come up and pick out a flower to take home. We decided that we would start with the oldest and move down to the youngest (me). After the other ladies had chosen their flowers, I went up to pick out one and the nice lady who works for the Cathedral handed me a bunch of flowers to take home. Well, I would hate for them to go to waste, so...

I put my new knowledge to work and created a nice arrangement with these beautiful blooms.

And now I think I'll rest, if you don't mind. Two hours at the luncheon and three hours on the road in heavy traffic is rather tiring, after all.

A New Twist on a Pasta Salad

Since my family has been so finicky lately, I decided to up the ante. Tonight's dinner was a pork loin roast with apples and onions and a pasta salad. Now, you may recall that I made a similar salad for our family's Easter dinner, but tonight's version has a different vinaigrette, giving it an entirely different identity.

I added broccoli (which I later blanched for a few seconds), red bell pepper, carrot, green onion, celery and roma tomato.

I cooked farfalle pasta for the dish.

On a whim, I decided to toss in a few blue cheese crumbles. Unfortunately, I didn't have any feta cheese on hand, or I would have used that instead.

Now it's time for the vinaigrette. The ingredients: one lemon, juiced, dijon mustard, salt, black pepper and olive oil. After tasting, I decided to add a bit of honey to round out the flavors.

What do you know? My family actually liked this. I had begun to give up on them.

What's that, you say? What about the pork roast? Once again, I forgot to take the after pictures. But since you asked so nicely, I will give you an idea of what you missed.

Earlier in the day, I prepared a marinade of balsamic vinegar, honey, dijon mustard, salt, black pepper, a smashed garlic clove and canola oil. The pork loin marinated for several hours in the refrigerator.

And now it's time to cook. I went out on my deck and pinched off a couple of small sprigs of my now-growing thyme, and a few leaves off my new sage plant. Then I roughly chopped some onion, and pulled a cup of homemade turkey stock out of the freezer. After some thought, I also grabbed an apple and sliced that thinly.

I seared the pork loin in canola oil, added the sage, thyme, apple and onion and allowed them to cook for a bit before adding the remaining marinade and the turkey stock. I placed a remote temperature probe into the thickest part of the meat and baked this in a 350 degree oven until the meat reached an internal temperature of 140 degrees.

I pulled the meat out and covered it with foil. I then placed the pot back on the stove top and reduced the liquid. After about 10 minutes, I sliced the pork loin and laid it on top of the apples and onions.

Now, you clever readers might notice that there are no more pictures. I really do need to work on remembering to take pictures of the finished dishes. Bad blogger, bad blogger.

Let's Try Something Different

Feeling as though I had gotten into a rut lately, I searched for a way to revamp an old favorite for dinner tonight. I started off by making a bourbon marinade for the pork tenderloin I had planned to serve.

The ingredients for the Bourbon Marinade. Since it is the middle of winter, I substituted 1/2 teaspoon of Herbes De Provence (the no gerbils mix) for the fresh herbs. Also, Kessler's (tm) is an American whisky rather than a bourbon. True bourbon can only come from a certain area of Kentucky and must meet certain legal requirements in order to be called bourbon.

BOURBON MARINADE

Again, I have adapted a recipe from Paula Deen. This is my version of a bourbon marinade. As usual, I tweaked the ingredients and the amounts to come up with something that I liked. If using dried herbs, use only half as much of each herb. This marinade works especially well with beef.

½ cup bourbon
½ cup brown sugar
1/3 cup soy sauce
¼ cup lemon juice
1 ½ tsp. Worcestershire sauce
1 tbs. Olive oil
½ cup water
½ tsp. Fresh thyme, chopped
½ tsp. Fresh Italian parsley, chopped

Mix all ingredients and pour into a zipper top bag. Place the bag in a dish before adding the meat. Push as much of the air out of the bag as possible and seal the bag. Place the container in the refrigerator and turn every hour or two to ensure that all the meat has been properly covered in the marinade. Marinade for 4 hours or even overnight. If roasting in the oven, pour the marinade over the meat and bake. If grilling, discard the remaining marinade.

The marinade is ready to be poured over the pork loin. Notice that I have put the zip-top bag in a container to ward off any potential refrigerator accidents.

And now we have an action shot of the marinade going into the bag. Do you have ANY idea of how hard this is to do by oneself?

Now, don't be a Sandra Lee by not 'burping' the bag. Burp the bag! The marinade must be in contact with the meat. This can only happen if the excess air is expelled from the bag. This must then go into the refrigerator for a few hours.

In order to make the marinade safe for consumption, I boil it for a few minutes. Do not skip this step, if you care for those who will eat your food, or if you don't want to be sued for food poisoning.

Okay, I forgot to photograph the finished pork loin. I had started it on the stove, and then moved it to the oven to finish. The pork loin came out of the oven when the internal temperature reached 140 degrees. I covered it with aluminum foil for 10 minutes before slicing and serving.

Also, I do not want to condemn my husband and daughter to my low-carb diet (can you hear the cheers of relief?), so I roasted a couple of russet potatoes, with onions for me. I also made my 'patented' Green and Gold Salad as an accompaniment. Oops, sorry, no pictures for this dish. You'll have to trust me: this is easy and good.

GREEN AND GOLD SALAD

This is a favorite recipe for Gary and Kelley. Kelley likes her peas uncooked anyway, and with the additional ingredients, she is in heaven. Frozen peas have been blanched during the processing, so there is no problem with not cooking them first. Oddly, people either love this recipe or hate it. This salad does not hold up well to storage, so the dressing needs to be added to the other ingredients just before serving.

1 pkg. (10 oz.) frozen green peas

1/2 c. shredded natural cheddar cheese
2 tbs. chopped onion

2 tbs. mayonnaise or salad dressing
1 1/2 tsp. prepared mustard

1/4 tsp. salt
crisp salad greens

Optional: fresh mint, finely chopped

Rinse peas with small amount of running cold water to separate the peas and to remove ice crystals; drain. Mix all ingredients except salad greens. Serve salad on greens.

Makes 4 or 5 servings. Marilyn’s note: don’t mix rest of ingredients with peas and cheese until just before serving.


Oh, and by the way? Happy Valentines Day to you and yours.