Monday, November 15, 2004

How to make Monday better

Mondays are typically a bad day for Will and for me, so I try to do something nice for him when he gets home after his 10 hour work day.

Today it was food. I mean, what could be better than a nice meal at home with your wife? Going to a screening of Rob Schrab's short films? Nah, we had that option and decided that staying at home was better. (I know. Oh, the pain of choosing.)

We had a pork tenderloin and I wanted to do something nice with it. I haven't been to the store lately, so I had to use stuff that was already in the pantry. Here's what I came up with (it doesn't have a name):

1 pork tenderloin
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon paprika
end of an onion, finely sliced (long, thin bits)
2+ tablespoons butter
1/8-1/4 cup good scotch

I butterflied the tenderloin. This sounds fancy but is incredibly easy. Cut the tenderloin not quite in half lengthwise (essentially, cut it all but about 1/2 inch through) and spread it out flat. I used a small roasting pan lined with tin foil and lightly sprayed with oil, but in retrospect I think I could have skipped the oil. I was making it up as I went along. Spread the sugar over the top then sprinkle on paprika. Throw the onions on thop of that and dot it with butter. (OK, when I say dot it with butter, I used thick slices and covered the qwhole thing. I'm sure I used more than 2 tablespoons, but I'm trying to make it sound healthier than it probably was.) Pour scotch over top and bake in a 400° oven for about 20 minutes. If you have a meat thermometer, it should read between 150° and 160° when the pork comes out of the oven. It would be helpful to baste once about halfway through cooking.

I made plain white rice to go with it, and poured this vidalia onion relish we bought over it. Yummmmm. Oh, and I tried to figure out a Jess-friendly way of doing this, but realized that I would have to eliminate the pork as well as the sugar, so it totally isn't worth it. I'll post some veggie food soon.