nummy

[kindkit]

Sometimes simple food is so damn good. My grocery store had pork sirloin roast (not as tender as the loin but more flavorful) on sale, so I bought a little one and roasted it up in a simple rub of olive oil and minced sage; I also cut some slits in the roast and stuck in slivers of garlic, which from now on I will always do because it makes an amazing difference in the flavor. In the pan around the pork I roasted a cut-up potato with a bit more olive oil and sage, and in a separate pan I roasted some asparagus spears with olive oil and a bit of salt.

This produced a very satisfying dinner for very little effort, plus a nice chunk of leftover pork roast for sandwiches and things.

Comments

[likeadeuce]

Oh, that sounds really good! I've never tried to cook pork -- I find it intimidating for some reason/am convinced I'll give myself food poisoning -- but this makes me want to give it a shot!

[kindkit]

You'd have to eat pork practically raw to have any risk of getting sick--the trichinosis organism is killed at 137 degrees Fahrenheit, at which point the meat is still pretty much blood-rare. It's safe to eat pork that is still slightly pink inside (and it tastes better and is juicier that way). Pork's probably a lot safer than chicken, or at least typical battery-farmed US chicken, because I've never heard of a salmonella risk with pork. But it has a scary reputation.

I think the key to meat roasting is a thermometer. I have one (it cost me about $20) with a probe that can be left in the meat as it roasts, and then an alarm will beep when the meat reaches the internal temperature that you've selected. For a lean pork roast, like the loin or sirloin, a good internal temperature when you remove it from the oven is 155 degrees; you let the roast rest for 15 minutes or so out of the oven and the temperature will rise about another 10 degrees. (If the roast is very small, the temperature won't rise as much and you'll want to take it out of the oven at 160 or so.)

One good thing you can do with lean cuts of pork is brine them before cooking to enhance the flavor. A good basic recipe is 9 cups of water (or part water, part flavorful liquid like apple cider), 1/2 cup of kosher salt (a bit less if you're using regular table salt), about 1/2 cup of sugar, honey, maple syrup, or other sweetner, and flavorings of your choice such as garlic, herbs, peppercorns, or chiles. Heat the water to dissolve the salt and sugar, then cool stick it in a big sealable bag in the refrigerator along with your pork. Just don't brine for too long--no more than an hour for pork chops and probably less, 5-6 hours for tenderloin or a very small roast, maybe 8 hours/overnight for a larger roast.

If you like cookbooks, I heartily recommend The Complete Meat Cookbook by Bruce Aidells and Dennis Kelly. I got it after I went back to eating meat (I was a vegetarian for 16 years) and it was a huge help.

[likeadeuce]

This is fantastic advice, thank you!

I'm also skittish about cooking chicken, and I usually end up microwaving it to the point of being flavorless, which is not a great solution! Assuming the meat cookbook covers poultry as well (?) that sounds like a good investment, as does the thermometer.

[kindkit]

microwaving it to the point of being flavorless

*weeps quietly*

The meat cookbook covers beef, pork, lamb, and veal but not poultry; Cook's Illustrated has a decent chicken and poultry cookbook. Or you might like something like James Peterson's Essentials of Cooking, which is a technique book rather than a recipe book--it does include some recipes, but also concentrates on the techniques of cooking various foods (such as sauteeing chicken) with suggestions for many, many variations. It's really helpful if, like me, you prefer to learn a method and improvise based around it rather than strictly follow a recipe every time.

The kitchen thermometer is the single most useful gadget and thus best kitchen investment I've ever made. I got mine at Bed, Bath, and Beyond, if I remember right. It's Pyrex brand and has two pieces--the time/temperature monitor, which has a magnet on the back so you can stick it on the fridge, and which you can use as a timer as well as a thermometer, and the probe that goes into the food, which has several feet of oven-safe cord and a plug at the other end that goes into the monitor. I don't recommend the cheaper meat thermometers with dial readouts. They're not as accurate and you have to actively remember to check the temperature rather than just sticking the probe into the food and setting the temperature alarm.

Besides being able to cook meat, I make much better tea since I bought the thing because I can time the brewing accurately!

[likeadeuce]

Awesome, thanks. And yes, a technique book sounds great. My problem with most attempts 'following recipes' is that they always seem to assume you already know the techniques, and thus are unhelpful.