Pork in Lavender Butter Wine Sauce

I was looking through some food Blogs and I found Daily Bread Journal, which is a wonderful site. On this site Toni lists a recipe , Pork Chop with Lavender Butter, that sounded intriguing to me. I have never cooked with lavender, to tell the trough I had never tasted lavender either, so I decided to go for it. Of course like most food bloggers I am unable to follow a recipe so this one has my own twist to it.

3 Tbs. butter
1/4 red onion, diced
1 1/2 tsp. diced garlic
1 Tbs lavender leaves, cut
1/4 cut white wine
salt and pepper to taste
10-16 oz of Pork scallopini, very thin cut pork loin.
flour for dredging
Vegetable oil for frying


Heat Pan (I used Cast Iron) to hot while you season the pork scallopini with salt and pepper and dredge in flour. Add oil to hot pan to about 1/4 inch and let it get hot and ripples form. lay floured pork into hot oil and brown on both sides. remove browned pork and place on plate and set aside. once all the pork is browned pour off all the oil from the pan.

Melt 1 1/2 TBS butter in pan, add onions and lavender. Saute until onion is toasted. Add wine and garlic, saute for another minute or more, till garlic is cooked. Add in the pork and for a few more minutes to heat the pork until heated through.

Just as suggested on Toni's blog I served with Roasted asparagus

Nami Nami really hits home

When I first found food blogs (last November) I was intrigued and wanted to know what the hoopla was all about so I started a blog and asked, why. However, one person answered the question why and deleted it before I ever saw it. After pondering and looking through other food blogs I just started posting on my blog and I have come to love it over the last few months. even though I love it I could never really say why.

Today I found a post on Nami Nami’s blog that finally answered the why in food blogging. On her happy 2^nd blogger birthday post she really hit home for me and I want to say Thank you for putting into words the essence of food blogging.

Lemon Tart

When ever we are going to go to friends for dinner my husband almost always asks me to make "that lemon tart" to take. Yes we all love Lemon Curd in our house but with 6 eggs and a whole stick of butter I try not to make if too often. Today we went to my friend Sharon's house for a BBQ and per my hubby's request I make lemon tart with an added kick, raspberry glaze. 1 pillsbury pie crust 6 eggs, beaten 1 1/2 cups sugar 1/2 cup butter (1 stick) grated zest of 4 lemons juice of 4 lemons Preheat oven to 400 degrees roll out one pillsbury pie crust and press it into a 9" tart pan (or you can use a pie pan if that is what you have) prick the bottom of the pie shell with a fork (if you like you can put beans or pie weights into the shell now, but I don't). Bake in the oven for 10 minutes. (remove beans if used) set pie shell aside. Put the eggs, sugar, and butter into a sauce pan and stir over med-low heat until sugar is dissolved. Add the lemon zest and juice and continue to cook, stirring constantly, until the lemon curd thickens slightly. Pour the curd into the prepared pie shell and bake for 20-25 minutes or until the filling is just set. let cool. for the raspberry glaze topping I halfed the berry glaze pie recipe and used raspberries and topped the tart with that.

Fried Green Tomatoes

How would you go about taking a nice picture of a fried green tomato? I took maybe 30 pictures and not one gave a beautiful representation of a fried green tomato. So, her is the picture I chose to used, for all its worth.


I found some nice firm green tomatoes at the market so I added fried green tomatoes to the menu.

I first washed to tomatoes and sliced them into maybe 1/4 to 1/3 inch slices. Too thin they turn to mush, to thick they burn before they are cooked.

I then laid them out and put salt and pepper on them

I got 4 bowls and filled each with buttermilk, flour (with salt and pepper added), beaten eggs, and bread crumbs.

I then heated a cast iron frying pan up, added oil to about 1/4 inch deep. I then took a slice of tomato dipped it in buttermilk then flour then egg and lastly bread crumbs. I put the tomato into the hot oil (I knew the oil was right because it bubbled when I added the tomato) and repeated with more tomato slices until the pan was full and I turned the heat down a little to keep them from burning. Turn the tomatoes when they are a nice brown on one side and drain on paper towel when the are brown on all sides.

Season with a little more salt and enjoy.

Serbian Grapevine Dolmas - Stuffed Grape leaves

My Husband is from Serbia so I often try to make dishes that he grew up with or at least something close to what he ate growing up. This week my attempt at Serbian fare is Stuffed Grape leaves. The kids would not even try them but my husband loved them and I thought they were very good as well, this is my first attempt at stuffed grape leaves after all.

30-40 Grape leaves soaked in salted water until soft or one large jar
2 T. oil
1 medium onion
1/2 cup rice
10 oz ground beef
10 oz ground pork
1/2 bunch dill, about 1/4 cup chopped
1 t. Serbian bio nacin, a dried vegetable seasoning with salt or just add salt to taste
pepper
2 eggs
chicken stock

2 T. Butter
1 T. flour
1 t red paprika pepper, I use some from Serbia that has seeds and all but I would think a good quality paprika you find in the US will work
1/2 cup chicken stock or water
1 cup white wine*

1. Heat oil and add finely chopped onion, cook slowly to soften. Then add the meat and cook until browned. Add rice, chopped dill, salt and pepper, mix well and cook together for a few minutes. Remove from heat and cool slightly, add egg and mix well.
2. Put a small spoonful of meat mixture on each grape leaf and roll into dolmas. Arrange them tightly in a pan; pour enough chicken stock (or water) to fill half way up the side of the dolmas. Cover and simmer over low heat for about 45 minutes, checking from time to time to be sure that the stock has not run dry.
3. melt butter in a sauce pan add flour and cook until light brown and nutty, add paprika pepper, and 1/2 cup stock and heat a few moments and add to dolmas, shack pan and add white wine and simmer for another 15 - 20 minutes or until rice is cooked through.

Serve with plain yogurt.

* if you don’t have white wine chicken stock will work well.

Crepes Montenegrin Style

Breakfast is a big deal in our house. The kids wake up and they are starving, the first thing my son says to me in the morning is "eat" and often they have yogurt and granola or oatmeal, but once in a while I feel ambitious and make crepes. And I have to admit they are not just for the kids. When vacationing in Montenegro last summer the cafe we frequented had crepes like this on the menu, layered with fresh fruit and whipped cream. ooh la la

Crepes:

1 cup a/p flour
1/4 t salt
2 T sugar
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 to 1.5 cups milk, to the right thin consistency
2 T melted butter

Sift the flour, salt, and sugar into a large bowl. make a well in the center and add the egg, milk, and butter and let set for 10 minutes.

add a little butter to a hot pan and pour in about 2 T crepe batter and quickly tilt and rotate pan to cover the bottom in an even thin layer. cook for about 1 minute and turn and cook for another 30 seconds and remove. Continue until all the batter is gone.

Serve with a good jam or as above.