Pork and Rice and everything nice ...

I really haven’t had a lot of time to write lately, so it makes complete sense that some of my friends (Summer) think that I have not been eating. I can assure you that I’m not wasting away and still cook every week. Work has been keeping me pretty busy, and not to mention the fact that I’m easily distracted by various hobbies and novelty ideas. There’s just not enough time in one day to accommodate my “ADD-ness”.

The fact the matter is, I’ve been eating, and eating well at that. Recently, I wanted to really cook some of the things that I really wanted to cook; using flavor profiles that I know has been proven to work to go about the business of making great foods. Don’t get me wrong, I still love to enjoy different types of ethnic foods, and will continue to explore all kinds of goodies, but sometimes, you just have to eat what you know is good.

Take “pork and rice” for example, very simple, very straightforward, and always comforting to have. The idea of this dish came from the fact that I simply didn’t have a lot of time to do the research required to make an authentic international dish. I’m sure most of you can relate to the hectic work schedule and having to wonder, “what’s for dinner?” For me, I like to think about “what’s for dinner” early in the morning so that I will have ample time to defrost proteins, to marinate something, or simply to know what I need to buy at the store in order to cook when I get home. If there’s one thing I hate most above all things is being hungry and not having a plan to resolve my hunger, bad things usually happens when it comes to that (I’m exaggerating here, I just get really bad headaches when I’m hungry).

So, to make “pork and rice”, here are some of the things that you’ll need in order to be organized ahead of time and cook well:

• Pork (tenderloin works best)
• Rice
• Brown sugar
• Garlic powder
• Rosemary
• Salt
• Peppers
• Sriracha sauce
• Capers (diced)
• Lime or lemon (anything sour really)
• Broccoli

Most of the ingredients above is to make sure that your marinate is well balanced; as for the broccoli and rice, you’ll want just steam the broccoli and cook the rice. I told you that this was simple. When it comes to marinating the meat, just rub the rest of the ingredients onto the pork, with the emphasis on salt, brown sugar, and Sriracha sauce. The idea is to make the pork well seasoned and savory. Be careful when using capers they’re really salty. Add 1 lime to the whole mix to balance everything out and also to make sure that marinate have some liquid to it; this will help keep the pork from being dry. You’ll want to marinate your pork for about 4-5 hours and cook it in the oven (on broil) for 20 mins on each side. Make sure to keep a close watch on the cooking progress since they meat could be easily burned due to the brown sugar. Another helpful tip is to let the pork “rest” for about 5 mins after you pull it from the oven; doing so will help locks in all the moisture.

To serve:

I found it to be delicious when I spooned some of the au jus (liquid or sauce that came from cooking the meat) onto the rice, then placed slices of pork on top. Best served with a side of broccoli or sauté green beans. Enjoy!