Another Cooking Light recipe!

I’m actually trying to be a good boy and maybe even drop a couple of pounds before the wedding.  What I really want to do is lose all of the weight I gained after I quit smoking, but I’m thinking short-term goals are probably more realistic.  A couple of pounds between now and October 14th.

I can do it.

Enter Cooking Light.  Now…  if you’ve picked up a copy of the magazine recently, you’ll notice that some of their recipes really are anything but light.  Lots of sugar, lots of butter…   Granted, they are favorite ingredients of mine, but sometimes sugar and butter are actually unnecessary in a recipe.  (Yes, you read that correctly!)

Just like the one I made tonight.  It calls for a minuscule amount of sugar in the spice rub, but… since the recipe later calls for  pepper jelly, I saw no reason to add it to the spice rub.

That being said, the dish came out stupendous!  It is a definite keeper.  It just rocked.  Vaguely sweet and vaguely spicy, but lots and lots of flavor.  The spices and the jelly really worked well together.

I followed the recipe pretty much as stated – except for the sugar in the spice mixture.

Ancho Pork Medallions

Pepper jelly and aromatic spices give your average pork tenderloin a bold new flavor. Serve with a spinach salad for a complete meal.

Other Time: 20 minutes minutes
Yield:  4 servings (serving size: 2 medallions)

  • 1 (1-pound) pork tenderloin, trimmed
  • 3/4 teaspoon ancho chile powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon sugar
  • 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
  • 1/8 teaspoon ground allspice
  • 2 tablespoons jalapeño pepper jelly
  • 1 teaspoon lime juice
  • 2 teaspoons olive oil

1. Cut pork crosswise into 8 equal pieces. Combine chile powder and next 4 ingredients (through allspice) in a small bowl; rub evenly over both sides of pork. Combine jelly and lime juice; set aside.

2. Heat oil in a large heavy skillet over medium-high heat. Add pork to pan; cook 1 minute on each side. Brush pork with half of jelly mixture; turn and brush with remaining jelly mixture. Cook 1 minute on each side or until desired degree of doneness. Remove pork from pan; let stand 5 minutes before serving.

CALORIES 168 ; FAT 6.1g (sat 1.6g,mono 3.2g,poly 0.6g); CHOLESTEROL 63mg; CALCIUM 7mg; CARBOHYDRATE 4.6g; SODIUM 363mg; PROTEIN 22.5g; FIBER 0.1g; IRON 1.2mg

The side dish was a fun one, too.

It was a bit of a clean out the refrigerator dish that went well with the pork.

Potatoes and Tomatoes with Raspberry Chipotle Sauce

  • 8 oz teeny potatoes
  • 4 green onions, chopped
  • 4 oz mushrooms, sliced
  • 2 tomatoes, diced
  • 1 tbsp cilantro, minced
  • 1 small jar Bronco Bob’s Roasted Raspberry Chipotle Sauce

Boil or steam potatoes until tender.

Saute green onions and mushrooms until lightly browned.  Add tomatoes and cook.  Add the chipotle sauce and cilantro.  Add the potatoes and mix well.

Let simmer a few minutes and serve.

We pick up little sample jars of the sauces whenever we hit Cost Plus out west.  It’s a fun store with lots of fun products from all over the world.  We’ve bought a lot of goodies there over the years, from furniture to dishware to Christmas ornaments and more.  I first shopped with them a bazillion years ago when their only store was on Bay Street in San Francisco.  A cavernous place where one could get lost for hours.  Alas, they’ve become a slick almost-cookie-cutter store and have re-branded themselves as “Cost Plus World Market” but I can still drop a few bucks there, easily.

But back to the veggies…

The sauce is smokey but not spicy-hot so it went well with the vegetables and the pork spices.

I can see more of this in our future…