Child's Own Sweet and Sour Pork Chops

My daughter is supposed to be blogging with me tonight to share her version of what happened in her kitchen tonight. Her success last night made her want to repeat it tonight and her concoction was truly truly delicious.

These are boneless pork chops, which she browned a bit. Then she added:

- about 1/2 can Market Pantry tropical fruit in juice (pineapple and various papaya)

- 1 tablespoon low sodium soy sauce

I knew she had a sweet and sour theme in mind, so I arranged all the Asian type spices on the counter and suggested she take a deep inhale of her pork and then smell the spices to see what went together.

She selected:

- one small piece crystallized/candied ginger (to soak in the hot sauce)

- a few pinches ground ginger

- a hearty amount of garlic powder

And then she added about 3/4 cup frozen three color pepper strips.

She served with a bagged salad, leftover Brussel sprouts and a side of commercial sweet and sour sauce.

From the chef herself:

Tonight I made dinner. I thought I would make pork. There was a lot of drama because I never made pork before. Then I decided to make sweet and sour pork. First, I put the pork in the pan and then cooked it for a while and flipped it.  I put in tropical fruit. Then I had to add spices. I smelled it to figure out what spices to put in. I put ginger, soy sauce,and garlic powder.Then I fried it and then served it with sweet and sour sauce. My parents LOVED it. 

I like my food to have a look and spices that fit a theme.

Honeyed Fruit

As I was prepping the fruit salad yesterday, at the last minute I decided to make white wine-honey sauce for it. It's a French recipe I found online for a dinner party, that depending on the dryness of the wine used to make the sauce can be enjoyable for children and adults alike. But that's if you use a sweet wine, like a Vouvray. I, in this case, used a dry Reisling made by a friend. (I save my old wine bottles for him and he returns one from the batch filled with home brew.)

My original experience with this recipe can be found here:
http://angelfoodcooking.blogspot.com/2009/04/fruit-salad-with-honey-wine-dressing.html

I thought yesterday's version was worth noting, in part because of the local nature of some of the ingredients. The honey was local honey and the wine, as I mentioned, came from a friend.

This is the list of ingredients for the sauce:
1/2 cup dry white wine
3 tablespoons plus two teaspoons honey
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
1 tablespoon granulated sugar

It's all supposed to be mixed in the blender. I used a measuring glass and a whisk. And I didn't use as much sugar. I never do. After you mix it, you're supposed to chill it in the fridge for 20 minutes. I slapped mine in the freezer for ten.

My fruits, as mentioned in the earlier post about this meal, were the leftovers of a fresh pineapple, a banana and the last of my strawberries sliced.

What was leftover, I let soak in the fridge (with some sauce left in reserve and I'm thinking ice cream). That became my breakfast this morning.

Thin Broccoli Quiche

So, today I made a thin quiche for lunch. The egg filling was four eggs and about 1 1/4 cup of milk. I sprayed the bottom of my pie dish with cooking spray and coated with fresh broccoli, about 1/3 teaspoon four color pepper, 1/2 teaspoon garlic salt, and thorough sprinkles across the broccoli of grated romano from Calandras.

I baked it at 425 for 12 minutes, then lowered the temp to 300 for the next twenty, keeping an eye on it because it's so thin.

This will accompany a fruit salad made from the last of the pineapple, the leftover strawberries and a big banana.

Salad will be served, but it's slightly wilted. My husband will still eat it.

Salad again...

Since it's amazingly hot today, I opted for quick salads for dinner, especially since my daughter didn't finish her lunch and had snacks at the neighbors and said she didn't want dinner. But she needed some fruit and/or vegetables.

So salad. With crumbled tomato and basil feta, raisins and organic ranch dressing. And a side of dried fruit (raisins, dates, papaya, strawberries, pineapple), cashews and peanuts.

But tell me... How do they manage to suck all the nutritional value out of dried fruit? That urks me. Especially since it's yummy.

Perfumed Pineapple Crumble (Crumble d'Ananas à la Vanille)

We had leftovers for lunch. Fruit from yesterday's 90th birthday party for Nana. The last of the chicken salad with pecan-raisin bread. And some more American brie.

My husband set that up while I prepared a Perfumed Pineapple Crumble for his cousin's baby shower this afternoon.

I adore this cookbook that Jessica got me from France. I had some pineapple from the farmers market so I thought I'd give the pineapple crumble a go. Jessica, when she cooks from one of these French cookbooks, translates the entire recipe and does the conversions, writing it all on the cookbook before she starts.

I don't.

I read over it, look up unfamiliar ingredients (like cassonade, I didn't know that was brown sugar) and then bring the laptop with me for conversions and last minute questions for wordreference.com. Most of the time, I start preparing it and realize I hadn't even read the whole recipe.

So, Crumble d'Ananas à la Vanille called for:
100 g de buerre mou + 1 noix pour le moule
150 g de sucre cassonade + 3 cuillierées à soupe pour le moule
1 ananas
4 cuillerées à café d'extrait de vanille liquide ou en poudre
150 g de farine

So, my conversion calculator suggested that 85 grams equals a cup...
1 cup butter, plus some to grease the pan
About 2 cups brown sugar, plus three "soup spoons" for the pan
1 pineapple
4 "coffee spoons" of vanilla extract (in liquid or powder. I would love to have vanilla powder.)
2 cups flour (okay, I ended up doubling this because my crumbs were really wet and sticky)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Butter the pan and sprinkle (saupoudre- isn't that a great verb?) with three tablespoons of brown sugar.

Cut the pineapple into pieces. "Perfume" them with two teaspoons of vanilla and mix well. Arrange in the pan.

In a mixing bowl, mix the remaining sugar, the flour and the butter (sliced and soft) with the tips of your fingers to make "sandy" crumbs.

Add two teaspoons of vanilla and mix.

Cover the pineapple and bake for about 45 minutes.

Serve lukewarm or cold with vanilla ice cream.

Odds and Ends, including French bread broccoli melts

Breakfast #1: 7 a.m.
Daughters eats most of a can of Dole Tropical Fruit (3.5 servings in the entire can) and one whole sheet of graham crackers.

Mommy's breakfast, 8:45 a.m.
One sheet graham crackers with peanut butter

Breakfast #2: 9 a.m.
Daughter eats one significant bowl of the homemade ham-spinach-white bean soup

Lunch with Daddy: 11:30 a.m.
Homemade bread with broccoli, ranch dressing and melted New York sharp cheddar and chocolate milk

Mommy's Lunch: 12:30 p.m.
Homemade French bread with cheddar