The Other White Meat

Do you guys remember that ad campaign?
We always laughed because even in the commercials the pork looked grey not white.

Anyways, I've always enjoyed pork, didn't know why it had such a bad rap...
well, unless you're Jewish, and Kosher, and then well, sure I get that...
but other than following some laws from the OT, how could you not LOVE the pork?!

Oh, and our daughter, who's a self proclaimed vegetarian...
...not because she has some ethical problem with the way the animals are treated....
    ....and PLEASE, lets not share that information with her just yet...
...no she doesn't eat meat because...
*Beef has squishy parts
*Chicken has stringy parts
...and the most obvious...
*Pork taste like poison!

She does make exceptions to her strict vegetarian menu when it comes to some foods...
...she likes hamburgers, just not one's made at home
...she likes Chicken McNuggets...possibly because they're NOT REAL!
...she likes pork chops and applesauce, I guess the applesauce hides the poison I've laced the chops in!

...sorry, I guess I went on a major tangent there...
I made for the first time ever...drum roll please...
...a Roast Pork Tenderloin last night...
and it was delicious...and everyone ate it up (we had company and they all really enjoyed it)...
all except for the daughter who stood her ground on the "taste like poison" box that she likes...

Oh, and this is a recipe that was taken from my new favorite cook book,
a gift from my new favorite sister-in-law, The Dinner Doctor,
...another tangent please...my wonderful sister-in-law not only gave me a GREAT cookbook as a gift, she herself has the book, so she went thru and tagged the recipes that they liked...
AND...she wrote notes in the margins of what worked and didn't work and why they liked a certain recipes...isn't that the GREATEST idea...she's good like that!
from my favorite recipe book author The Cake Mix Doctor...

and how can you not love a recipe that has 4 ingredients; 5th ingredient optional...and only 3 steps?!?
Roast Pork Tenderloin with Apricot Balsamic Sauce
1/2 cup Apricot preserves or jam
2 Tbl Balsamic vinegar (I was out and used apple cider vinegar, and it was still good)
1 pound pork tenderloin
salt and pepper to taste
Lime or Lemon wedges (optional)

1.  Preheat over to 450* (THIS is a MUST...do not wait to turn your oven on at the last minute!)  Mix the apricot preserves with the vinegar (the recipe says to "pulse the mixture in a food processor or blender until smooth"...I didn't want to wash out my food processor after this, so I just put the two in a bowl and whisked it with my small whisk!...worked beautifully!)...so mix the two however you feel you want!
2.  Place the port tenderloin in a 13x9 pan (I lined mine with foil to make clean up easier...only last time I bought foil it was for some sort of project and it was at the dollar store and it was apparently just a product calling itself foil, and was HORRIBLE...so of course it ripped during the baking process and then the apricot preserves, foil, and pan became joined as one and took WAY more work to clean than had I just left the foil out of the pan...but if you have REAL foil, (as in Reynold's Wrap Foil) I would recommend this to help your clean up!).  Season the pork with salt and pepper (or you can purchased a pork tenderloin already coated in black pepper).  Spoon 1/2 the jam mixture evenly over the top.
3.  Roast the pork until browned and the juices run clear when pierced with a knife (I recommend a meat thermometer when cooking with pork), and the meat is still barely pink, about 30-35 minutes.  About half way through, (about 15-20 minutes) the roasting remove pork and spoon remaining jam mixture over the pork and return to the oven.  When the roast is done, remove from oven and cover the roast with foil and let it rest for 10 minutes.  Serve with lime or lemon wedges.

*most of us might be aware that our oven "cooks hot" or "cooks cool"...it's really good to know how much especially when baking something at this temp...my oven is 75 hotter than it should be, had I set it for 450 it would have actually been cooking at 525, can you say burned pork-ka-bobs?!?

Served this is Lime Infused Rice, Salad, and Sourdough bread.