Honey Glazed!

Hello there, readers! I'd like to start off by apologizing for not posting for a few days. It was a pretty hectic weekend and while I did do some dining out and about, none of them were noteworthy enough to mention here, unfortunately. I think the best food I ate this weekend was at my friend Heidi's house, where we celebrated our friend's baby shower, and Heidi hosted...she's such a great entertainer, and a wonderful cook!

Today was a laid back day, and I finally had time to prepare a meal at home again - it's been a few days so it was great to get back into the kitchen! Tonight, we are having Honey-Glazed Pork with Wilted Greens. I got this recipe from Martha Stewart Living Magazine a few years ago and have made it a few times since then. It's a foolproof easy dinner, and it's delicious!

Let's get our mise en place in place. You'll need:

2 teaspoons Dijon mustard

3 1/2 tablespoons red-wine vinegar

4 tablespoons raw honey

1 large garlic clove, finely chopped

1 teaspoon coarsely chopped fresh rosemary

1 tablespoon plus 4 teaspoons olive oil

1 3/4 pounds pork tenderloin

3/4 teaspoon coarse salt

freshly ground pepper

1 large fennel bulb, trimmed and sliced lengthwise into thin strips

1/2 head escarole, cut into 2-inch strips

1/2 pound spinach, washed well

It's a pretty simple prep right off the bat, huh? The first thing I did was preheat my oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. In a small bowl, whisk together 1 teaspoon mustard, 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar, 2 tablespoons honey, garlic, rosemary (I ran out of rosemary, so I used some dried thyme - not AS flavorful, but it works) and 2 teaspoons oil.

Once your glaze is made, place your pork tenderloin into a shallow baking dish and pour the glaze on top. Flip the pork a few times to coat all sides really well and then sprinkle the top with a generous amount of salt and pepper. Roast the loin in the oven for 30 - 35 minutes (until the thickest part reaches 155 degrees on a meat thermometer). Spoon the glaze over the pork occasionally as it cooks.

Once you pull the meat out of the oven, you want to let it rest for 5-10 minutes before cutting into it. If you are using a meat thermometer, you want it to read 160 degrees before you cut into it. Check out my post on The Resting Period for more info on this process!

While the pork is resting, make the vinaigrette for your greens by whisking together 2 tablespoons honey, 1 1/2 tablespoons vinegar, and 1 teaspoon mustard. Whisk until the honey is dissolved and then slowly add a tablespoon of olive oil into the mix until it is emulsified well. If you want, you can also whisk in any cooking juices from the dish the pork is in.

Add 2 teaspoons of oil to a large saute pan, along with a splash of water. Add the fennel, escarole and spinach to the pan and cook until the greens are wilted, about 1 1/2 minutes.

Like the other night, this large amount of greens will wilt down to about a third of this size. Once that has happened, add the vinaigrette along with some salt and stir the greens to coat, about 30 seconds. Remove from the heat immediately.

I let my greens sit for an extra minute in the pan and they got a little over-cooked, so once they are done, make sure to plate them immediately so they are removed from the heat. Slice the pork about 1/2 an inch thick and arrange on the plate with the greens. Tah-Dah!

A Little Birdie Told Me...

Tonight, my quails are defrosted and ready to go, so it's time to make Quail with a Spiced Honey Dressing, from Gordon Ramsay's In The Heat of the Kitchen. We're going to use an interesting poached-grilled technique in this recipe, which I've never tried before! The quails will be served on a bed of sauteed potatoes and arugula leaves. I'm looking forward to this!

First thing to do is our mise en place:

The quails are trussed with toothpicks through their legs, to secure them for cooking...ya know, so they don't flail around in there! :) Now, my first step is to get 4 cups of chicken broth boiling with a few thyme sprigs thrown in. I seem to have used all of my fresh thyme, so I threw in some dried stuff instead...it's not ideal, but it works in this case.

It'd look prettier if I had those fresh thyme sprigs!

While I was waiting for the broth to boil, I put some sliced potatoes in a cast iron pan, with some olive oil as well as some salt and pepper. It takes some time to saute potatoes until browned so it's best to start them right away. This recipe doesn't take very long, so putting the potatoes on was one of my first priorities.

Once the broth was boiling, I added the trussed quails to the pot. You only want to cook them for a couple of minutes once the broth is simmering again. After that couple of minutes was up, I pulled them out of the pot with some tongs and patted them dry with some paper towels.

Now that the poaching part of the process is done, it's time to grill them! I put some cooking spray all over a grill pan and placed it on the heat to get warm. While it was heating up, I stuffed each quail with a rosemary sprig and some strips of sliced lime zest. I seasoned each quail with salt and pepper and brushed them with some olive oil.

Now, that's a compromising position!

Meanwhile, I've whisked together a sauce of honey, soy sauce, coarse grain mustard, dijon mustard (I replaced the Dijon mustard with a delicious Champagne Shallot Mustard from Stonewall Kitchen) and roasted sesame oil. I placed the stuffed, poached quails in the grill pan and proceeded to turn them quite often for the next 10 minutes (I think I could have done with a minute or two less, to be honest).

Once the quails were done grilling, I transferred them to a dish. I poured my sauce over and tossed them in the dressing until they were nicely coated. At this point, I let them marinate for about 5 minutes.

After that 5 minutes was up, I plated the potatoes and sprinkled some arugula leaves on top. They started to wilt with the heat of the potatoes, and I used a pair of tongs to place the quails on top. I then drizzled some of the extra sauce on top! Check that out!

All in all, that's about 20 minute of hands-on cooking time. Not bad for a weeknight meal!