Food, Glorious Food

Someone I met complained to me that, while their husband was perfectly capable of cooking, he only ever made very simple things, not having the confidence for "proper meals". Well, I have to tell you that I do all the major cooking in my household, for exactly the same reason - but in reverse. My wife, the AG, has been so demoralised by people telling her that her cooking is awful that she just won't try any more. This is a great shame, because what she does cook is always beautifully cooked. Oh well!

So, for those of us who believe ourselves to be culinarily impaired, here's a recipe for Grilled Pork Steaks. As with every dish, there are a few principles to remember. The main one is to get all your ingredients out and ready in advance. Then do the preliminary work, like trimming, chopping, etc., so that all the cooking effort can be done without distraction. Finally, enlist some others in the household to do things like setting the table, putting out drinks, etc.

The ingredients are
4 pork cutlets or steaks, each of about 6 ounces (160g)
Pepper

(for the marinade)
1 small onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, chopped
2 tablespoons of cooking oil
2 oz sesame seeds or ground-up peanuts
0.5 teaspoon of Cayenne pepper
1.75 pints of beer (e.g. Heineken)
2 teaspoons of honey
2 teaspoons of mustard (e.g. French's)
4 teaspoons of lemon juice

The method is:

1. Fry the onion and garlic in the oil until the onion is becoming translucent
2. Add the sesame (or peanut) and continue to fry until the seeds are lightly browning.
3. Add the Cayenne pepper
4. After a minute or two, add the beer, honey, mustard, and lemon. Mix in well.
5. Remove all this from the heat, allow to cool somewhat in a bowl large enough to add the meat.
6. Roll the steaks in the pepper and add to the bowl of marinade.
7. Cover the bowl with foil, and leave in the fridge for 3 hours or so (the longer the better!).

When ready to serve, scrape off most of the marinade from the steaks, sprinkle with salt, and grill them for about 5-7 minutes on each side at a medium heat. Do not use a high heat for this, as the pork will become dry and leathery! During the grilling process, baste the steaks frequently with marinade in order to keep them moist.

So you see that actual cooking time is about 10-15 minutes, with little maintenance during this time. This means that you can be finishing up cooking whatever else you want to serve as the steaks cook. A good accompaniment is cubed and fried potatoes, where you first boil the potatoes for about 20 minutes (instead of the normal 30 or so), cut them into little cubes, fry another chopped onion and then add the spuds and fry them too. Wonderful taste!

Have fun cooking.

TTFN