Pork with Red Wine Poached Pears

I made a thing.

It started with some pork chops. I like applesauce with my pork chops, and we didn't have any, so I thought I'd do something else fruity with them. Pork and fruit seems to work pretty well. So I dug around the cookbooks in the kitchen and found a recipe for Prune and Sage Pork Chops.

But I didn't have any prunes. Or any sage. Or, in the end, any white wine, thyme, shallots, chicken stock, or parsley... or effectively _any_ of the ingredients for the recipe. (Time for a shop.) So I faked it, stealing a few ideas from the original, and got:

~3/4 cup red wine (a Merlot)
the juice from a tin of tinned pear halves
salt and pepper
~1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary
"some" chipotle pepper sauce, to taste (more than you think - the sweet of the rest drowns out the chili.)

Brought to a simmer in a small pot, removed from heat, added the pear halves, covered and let sit. Seasoned the pork chops and seared on both sides in a pan, then removed to a tray in the oven until just done, then removed to rest. Put a nob of butter in the chop pan with some salt and pepper and about 1/4 cup diced onions. Sauteed for a couple of minutes, then added 1 tablespoon of flour and sauteed for another minute. Stirred in the pears and the pear liquid and simmered for ~4 minutes, until thickened somewhat. Added the juice of 1/2 a lemon (one of the sweeter Meyer ones, from my grandmother's garden) and removed from the heat. Poured the sauce over the chops and served with boiled baby taters and broccoli.

Really rather nice. I would not do this without the chipotle - or at least some form of chili - and lemon juice; it would be too sweet. Could have used a bit more rosemary (or possibly some of the sage I didn't have.)

Figured I'd best write it down; there is no way I'm coming up with the same thing from the same starting point a second time...

Arse-speriment

Take a whole smoked chicken, bought from the markets purely for its novelty value.

Then come up with a plan of what to do with it.

AHHA!
Remove some of its meat. Chop roughly. Fry in butter and olive oil, cracked pepper, half a lemon (squeezed, then quartered again and pieces chucked in the pan), thyme and rosemary.
Move to a plate, deglaze pan with wine and a bit more lemon juice. Reduce until doesn't smell alcoholic. Keep juices.
Saute leek and garlic. Add risotto, mix. Add the wine juice, allow to be soaked up by rice. Slowly add vegeta stock until rice is cooked, like usual.
Add frozen peas, mix through, 4 minutes.
Add chicken, mix through, allow to reheat.
Warmed crusty bread, butter, pepper and white wine. Tau and Tittle's chardy is nice. But a Riesling would be better.

Phwar.



P.S. Arse-speriment: an experiment that could go arse up. You don't know until you try.

Experiment

I've recently discovered gnocchi. It's more exciting than pasta, and can live in the freezer for emergencies. But I need ideas of what to put on it.
The first time round, I think we just had parsley/rocket/basil chopped finely, parmesan cheese and a drizzle of oil. I do remember it being tasty.

Tonight, I thought I'd make a sauce.
I've thrown half an onion (I had it lying around) and some garlic in a pan. Let them saute. Thrown in a chorizo, thinly sliced (everything's thinly sliced) and movd it around a fair bit, until some of the fat is leaving the sausage. I've tipped a can of diced toms and half my glass of red in it. There's also a big bay leaf and a spring of thyme. And cracked pepper.
I thought I'd let it simmer until the tomato has collapsed, and it's thicker.

I'll let you know if it works.

EDIT:
It were well tasty!
In the last 10 minutes or so I cooked it on high with the lid off, to help it turn into a sticky mess. Added a bit of gnocchi water when it got too dry, and that was great - the floury water helped to sauce it up good.
Served it with lots of parsley (standard 'green' around my house) and parmesan cheese.