Pork Chops with Red Pepper Jelly

Every once in a while, my husband decides to help make a meal outside of his usual grilling and/or smoking meats (my mom reads this, so don't insert your "That's what she said" here). Tonight he made a guest appearance in the kitchen to make the main part of tonight's meal, Pork Chops with Red Pepper Jelly. A "Southern Living" recipe, this was a great, relatively quick weeknight meal and was surprisingly sweet and savory, not packed with heat as I originally expected:

http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=1951499

Don't worry if you can't find bone-in pork loins for this; we used thicker boneless pork chops instead. You will just have to adjust the cooking time based on the cut of pork you choose to use.



For sides, we fixed a Spanish Potato Salad (from the now well used Tabasco cookbook) and Green Beans with Caramelized Onions. (By the way, those are definitely, definitely caramelized onions, not "Oh shit I've burned the onions.")

Spanish Potato Salad
1 lb. new potatoes, scrubbed
1/4 c. sliced celery
1 medium red onion, thinly sliced
1/4 c. mayonnaise
1/4 c. Greek or plain yogurt
2 Tbsp. orange juice
1/2 tsp. Tabasco
1/2 tsp. salt
Fill a medium saucepan with 1/2 inch of salted water and bring to a boil. Add the potatoes, cover, and cook until done, about 30 minutes. Drain, cool, and cut into 1/4-inch slices. (To speed up the cooling process, just run the potatoes under cold water for a few minutes until they're easy to handle.)

Chill the potatoes, celery, and onion until ready to serve. For the dressing, beat together the mayo, yogurt, orange juice, Tabasco, and salt in a small bowl. Toss the potato salad with the dressing (use as much or as little as you wish) just before bringing it to the table.



Green Beans with Onions
Heat a tablespoon or so of olive oil and a pat of butter on medium heat; add about a cup of chopped onions and let cook until transparent (usually takes about 8-10 minutes). Add the green beans, salt to taste, pepper, and saute. I like a bite to green beans and a bright green color, so I usually saute this about 10 minutes.

Tomorrow night: leftovers. But I'm super excited about Friday's meal, so stay tuned! In the meantime:



Just look at that enthusiasm for cooking!