A great week of eating

Throughout the week I've meant to blog about whatever I was making for dinner because we ate very well this week. In the end I didn't get time until today so now here's a recap of the highlights.

Starting this month, Jason and I have tried to stick to a financial diet (as I like to call it) where we attempt to adhere to a very strict budget. (I'm happy to report that so far we've done very well!) One of the consequences of our financial diet is that I must be extra creative to use what we have at home in a such a way that we don't purchase near as many groceries each week as we used to.

Thanks to the generosity of my mom and Joseph, we have a freezer stocked with local pork and beef (local to Lawrence, KS at least) so I'm always trying to find an easy recipe to use what meat we have. This one was a big hit this week!

Spiced Pork Chops with Apple Chutney (plus some Steamfresh veggies from the freezer)

The recipe actually uses a grill pan indoors to prepare the pork but I decided to throw the chops on our gas grill.

This is another gem from Cooking Light's Complete Meals in Minutes

30 minute recipe

Spiced Pork Chops with Apple Chutney

Chutney:

1 tablespoon butter

5 cups (1/4 inch) cubed peeled apple (about 3 apples)

1/4 cup dried cranberries

3 tbsp brown sugar

3 tbsp cider vinegar

2 tsp minced peeled fresh ginger

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp dry mustard

1/8 tsp ground allspice

Pork:

3/4 tsp ground chipotle chile pepper

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/2 tsp ground coriander

1/4 tsp black pepper

4 (4-ounce) boneless center-cut pork loin chops, trimmed

Cooking spray

1. To prepare chutney, melt butter in a non-stick skillet over medium-high heat. Add apple; saute 4 minutes or until lightly browned. Add cranberries and next 6 ingredients; bring to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer 8 minutes or until apples are tender; stir occasionally.

2. To prepare pork, while chutney simmers, heat a grill pan over medium-high heat. Combine chipotle and next 4 ingredients; sprinkle over pork. Add pork to pan; cook 4 minutes on each side or until done. Serve wtih chutney.

Yield: 4 services (serving size: 1 chop and about 1/3 cup chutney).

**Here's where I diverted from the recipe. First, I griilled bone-in pork chops (what we had on-hand) using the following instructions I found online. Preheat grill on high. Lay down the chops for 1 minute, flip and grill another minute. Then turn down heat to medium and rotate the chops a quarter turn to give them diamond grill marks. Grill 3 minutes then flip and grill another 4 minutes on low.

I usually have a hard time trusting grill recipes but I put followed the directions. Then put the chops on a plate and covered it with aluminum foil to rest. The online instructions recommending resting 5-10 minutes so I went back inside and started the chutney.   

Another night this week I relied on Real Simple magazine's "10 ideas for: ground beef" section of the January 2010 issue. This is a regular item in the magazine and one of my favorites. My first foray into new ideas for ground beef - Mediterranean beef pitas.

You too can access the quick, easy, and delicious recipe from Real Simple here.

Crunchy taco night and homemade margarita pizza with spinach both were consumed before thoughts of pictures came to mind. Whoops!!

For breakfast on both Saturday and Sunday, I FINALLY tried Mark Bittman's More-Vegetable-Than-Egg-Frittata that I printed from his column on July 15, 2009. That's a long time to hold onto a recipe without trying it! Here is my version of his recipe.

1. Used 1 tbsp olive oil and 1 tbsp butter in an oven-safe skillet and turned heat to medium. When hot and melted, added sliced vidalia onion, sprinkled it with salt and pepper, cooked 3 minutes and then added thinly sliced (and rinsed) potatoes. I cooked the potatoes for about 7 minutes and then added 1-inch pieces of fresh (and local) asparagus and fresh green pepper (not local yet). Then I realized that I was supposed to turn the heat up when I first added the veggies. :-) Oops! I continued cooking the veggies for another 5 to 7 minutes until the potatoes were tender and the asparagus was tender but firm.

2. Added torn basil leaves and turned the heat to low. Cooked the basil and veggies another minute or so while I scrambled the egg.

3. Beat 3 local eggs with 1/3 cup shredded parmesan, a little salt, and some black pepper. Poured the mixture over the veggies and then turned the pan back and forth until the egg coated the entire bottom of the pan. Then I let the eggs cook until set and tossed the whole pan under the broiler for two minutes to set the top. (Bittman says it takes 10 minutes or so to set but my pan and stove must hold the heat because it only took a 3 to 4 minutes to set.)

This morning, instead of asparagus, green pepper, and onion, we had leftover taco meat and spinach. I think this is my new favorite "kitchen sink" recipe where I can dump in anything.

Since Mark Bittman's yield was 2 or 4 servings, Jason and I opted for the 2 servings and each ate half the pan. But really that is the beauty of this recipe. You'll feel like you're getting a lot of food when you're really getting a lot of veggies with only 1 1/2 eggs!