Saturday, May 21, 2011

Pork Salome

Unfortunately, I no longer have a smart phone: it has been replaced with a $20 device whose camera leaves much to be desired.

I lived in Boise, Idaho for awhile as an adolescent. I did not like it very much, and there's very little I miss about it. But if I had a teleporter, I would be having lunch at Bar Gernika on a weekly basis*. And I would order the Solomo sandwich with croquetas on the side. The warm, soft, chickeny croquetas - I have never encountered their equal, and attempting to make them at home would probably break my heart. The Solomo, or rather, its pork and pimiento filling, I did decide to attempt however, and this is what I came up with:

PORK SALOME**

~1 pound pork - my grocery store sells what appears to be a pork loin that has been thinly sliced. You basically want relatively thin slices and/or medallions, how you get 'em is up to you.

1 jar roasted peppers (I happened to have some Trader Joe's brand handy)

1 lime

1 clove garlic (or so)

salt, pepper

Juice the lime into a bowl. Add the entire jar of roasted peppers, liquid included (you may want to dice them a bit. I didn't, out of laziness, figuring I could just do that once they got to my plate. It worked out fine. But if you are making this for a group, I'd suggest strips or something along those lines). Add pork, stir well. Leave to marinate for a few hours (probably not more than 2-3, and maybe it'd be better to do less. I think the lime juice dries the pork out some. I guess you could potentially add it during cooking, but I think maybe it like, shocks the meat into absorbing more flavor? I dunno.).
(If, as I did, you're making kale and rice to accompany this dinner - which was quite delicious - you'd begin put the rice on, then get the kale going, then turn your attention to the meat. The timing worked out perfectly.)
In a large pan, melt a pat of butter and add a bit of olive oil. Fish the pork out with your fingers and brown it on each side, adding garlic salt and pepper to the side facing up once you've put the piece down. Once it's browned - ie, basically cooked, if it's thinly sliced - squeeze in the garlic (I admit, you can probably skip this step) and then dump the marinade over the top, bring to a boil, and turn it off. Boom, you're done.
The pork is juicy and infused with the flavor of the roast peppers. I think the lime is key, because it cuts the heavy sweetness of the peppers just a bit. I'd recommend a nice white wine to go with it. I had some Espirito Lagoalva 2007 in the fridge, so I drank that. Pleasant a wine though it be, it was a little too sweet. I think you want something slightly dry, but still fruity.



*It's a strange quirk of Boise - it is a strange magnet for various ethnic minorities. There is a Basque part of town, which is actually one block, consisting of a small museum/cultural center, some sidewalk art, and Bar Gernika. Or at least, that was the case when I lived there, which was about 15 years ago.

**Yes, I changed the name slightly.

2 comments:

Catherine Meyers said...

Hi Culture Vulture,

My name is Catherine Meyers, I'm the admin of a high traffic web/blog directory (PR5) and a games web, I’ve been reading your blog and it's articles with interesting recipes (this one seems very tasty, I may add), and would like to offer you a link exchange with my sites, hoping that they can serve as valuable entertainment to your site’s visitors and more importantly help improving the web traffic of Theories of Bacon. If you are interested please let me know.

Cheers!

Cathy

culture_vulture said...

Hi Catherine,
I would be happy to check out your site, and of course would appreciate it if you posted a link to mine. The idea of formalized "link exchange" is a bit strange to me; I really just keep this blog for fun, not for business/profit. But I'd be happy to post a link to your site(s?) if they seem interesting.