Garnished Pork Chops Are Easily Prepared

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28929, 24 June 1959, Page 3

Garnished Pork Chops Are Easily Prepared

[By

"ELIZABETH"]

One of our most helpful allies when we have guests for dinner are pork chops for it is so easy to prepare them ahead and pan-cook them in the oven in a host of different and delicious ways. There is no last minute flutter of cooking or serving. Here the chops are quickly prepared and cooked, then merely dished at the last moment on to a hot large platter. Surround them with glazed apple quarters, sage and onion, stuffed tomatoes, buttered pineapple slices, small mounds of green peas and diced carrot, and duchesse potatoes piped round in a border. The effect is colourful, attractive and appetising.

Porcupines Ingredients: 6 pork chops 1 large green pepper 2 oz almonds 2 onions A little flour H cups milk Salt and pepper 1 large tin pineapple rings Butter 6 large firm tomatoes 1 packet sage and onion stuffing or about 2 cups homemade stuffing Cooking apples and -sugar 3 large carrots 1 large packet green peas Potatoes Butter, milk and 1 egg Method: Wipe pork chops and place in baking dish. Remove seeds from pepper and cut the shell into thin rings. Sprinkle over the chops. Blanch and finely shred almonds and sprinkle over. Peel and slice onions and separate into rings. Dip in milk, then in flour and scatter over. Pour remaining milk over, dust with salt and pepper and bake about 1 hour in a moderately hot oven.

Cook potatoes, drain and mash smooth with butter, milk and egg. Beat until creamy, then pipe in a ruching round a very large platter. Scoop centres from tomatoes and fill with seasoning; bake until tender. Drain pineapple and place the slices on a sponge roll tin dotted with butter. Bake until heated through and lightly browned or toast a few minutes under a grill rnd keep hot. Cook apple quarters in syrup until tender and clear. Arrange prepared fruit and vegetables round the platter and place in a low even until required. Lift the pork chops into the centre and serve immediately.

Chop And Tomato Toad In Hole

Family favourite for a wintry night is a Toad-in-the-hole, baked either in one baking dish or, if you have the appropriate size in ovenware dishes, in, individual portions. Here chops and tomatoes make individual toads, served with a delightful barbecue sauce to add piquancy and interest. Ingredients: 6 chops 6 tomatoes 2 eggs separated 1 cup milk and water Flour 1 teaspoon baking powder salt and pepper Sauce 1 chopped onion 1 cup chopped celery 2 oz butter 1 tablespoon flour 1 large tin tomato soup 1 teaspoon Worcester sauce Method: Trim chops and arrange one in each fireproof individual dish with a whole tomato. Place a small piece of butter on the meat of each and bake until the meat is browned and the tomato cooked. Whisk egg yolks into cup of milk or milk and water and a little salt and pepper. Whisk in flour gradually' until the* consistency is like fairly thick cream. Stand until required. When the meat is cooked, whisk the egg whites untill stiff and fold through the creamy mixture, together with a teaspoon of baking powder. Pour over the chops and return to a hot oven until the toads are puffed and browned. Melt butter and in it saute celerj' and onion until golden and cooked. Stir in 1 tablespoon of flour, then tomato soup and Worcester sauce, stirring continually until smooth and boiling. Serve very hot with the toad-in-the-hole as soon as they come from the oven.

Mutton Cassoulet Stewing mutton makes a much more delicious meal than its origin suggests if cooked long and slowly in a casserole, with dried beans and tomatoes. This is one casserole which really needs two days for the making, for it is so much nicer if the meat is cooked and the excess fat taken off after chilling or standing overnight. It can be the most warmly satisfying and savoury meal of the week. Ingredients: About 31b stewing mutton 2 teaspoons salt 11b dried beans 1 cup grated uncooked carrot 4 oz bacon 2 onions 1 clove, finely chopped garlic I 1 tin or bottle of tomatoes ■ 1 bay leaf 1 green pepper Salt and pepper Method: Just cover meat with ■ water and two teaspoons salt and i simmer gently for about 1J hours or until meat is tender. Allow 1 to stand in the liquid and, when ; chilled, remove the fat from the • top. Trim the fat and bones away 1 and cut the meat into neat pieces. • Place the beans in the liquid, 1 heat to boiling and cook for two ! minutes, then allow to cool and ’ soak in the liquid at least an ' hour. Then reheat and simmer 1 until the beans are cooked.

Chop bacon and fry until crisped. Drain out and in the dripping fry minced onion and garlic and saute slowly for fifteen minutes. In a large casserole combine meat, bacon, onion, tomatoes, chopped green pepper, grated carrot and the beans with their liquid. Season with salt, pepper and a teaspoon of sugar. Cover with a lid and cook in a very slow oven about three hours, adding a little more liquid during cooking if necessary.

Parsnip Wine

Parsnips make an excellent wine. This is a good recipe with economical ingredients. Ingredients: 41b parsnips 3zlb sugar 1 lemon £oz yeast U gallons cold water Method: Scrub the parsnips well, but do not peel them. Slice them thinly and put them into a preserving pan or large saucepan with the water. Cook till the parsnips are tender, but not mushy. Strain off the liquid. After straining throw away the parsnips and return the liquid to the pan. Add sugar and thinly sliced lemon and simmer for three" quarters of an hour, stirring occasionally. Strain the liquid -through butter muslin into a large bowl and when lukewarm stir in the yeast. Cover the bowl and leave for four days, then stir the liquid well and bottle it. Cork loosely at first. The wine will be drinkable in six months, but it is better if left for nearly a year. Add about a teaspoon of sugar to each bottle after a month or so. This helps to clear the wine, helps the yeast to produce alcohol, and takes away any sharp taste.

Oriental Pork Chops Here pork chops are arranged and cooked in an ovenware dish in a spicy apricot chutney sauce to add fruity tang. Ingredients: 6 pork chops 1 apple 1 onion 6 oz dried apricots 1 tablespoon Worcester sauce 1 tablespoon soy sauce 1 tablespoon made mustard 1 tablespoon vinegar 1 teaspoon salt 2 tablespoons brown sugar 2 cup water

Method: Soak dried apricots overnight. Mince or finely chop apple and onion. Place in a saucepan with water (use water in which apricots were soaked), vinegar, sauces, mustard, and sugar and cook gently for ten minutes. Add drained apricots and continue cooking for ten minutes.

Fry pork chops until well browned on both sides, then drain out of the dripping and arrange in an ovenware dish. Lift out apricots and arrange neatly round them. Then cover chops with remaining sauce. Cover and bake about one hour in a moderate oven. Serve surrounded with green peas, and fluffy mashed potatoes.