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Marinate a pork loin in my bell pepper marinade.
Sprinkle with crushed dry fresh thyme leaves. Sprinkle with salt and add lots of fresh ground pepper.
Just before it’s ready to sauté, use a thin sharp knife to cut the pork loin in half. Then cut each half in half again. Keep cutting until you have made all the medallions equal in size.
Toss the individual medallions in the marinating liquid again, just quickly, and using a spider spoon, remove the medallions and slide them into a very hot sauté skillet with low sides.
Listen for the sizzle. The skillet needs to be very hot but adjust it so the pork doesn’t burn. Don’t touch for a few minutes as the loin pieces sear. Absolutely do not overcook.
When they don’t stick to the pan surface, using an egg turner, move the medallion pieces around the skillet, tumbling them so all sides come in contact with the pan surface. This all happens in just minutes and like with a minute-steak, cooks very quickly.
Don’t leave the stove. Empty the skillet that has a slightly browned surface and add a large dollop of butter.
Toss quartered white, fresh, firm, button mushrooms (I use about two cups) just to sear once over lightly in the very hot sizzling butter. Add a half teaspoon of fresh dried, crushed thyme. ots of salt and fresh ground pepper, only after the mushrooms have seared. Add the mushrooms to the pork loin medallions bowl and toss.
There should be only a smear of butter in the pan. Use it to sauté a half small onion, chopped very fine. Keep the onion moving and turn the burner to low.
Leaving the onion in the skillet, deglaze the very hot pan with about a cup of half-and-half cream. Scald the cream, and using a wooden spoon, move the onions around. Let the cream rise and fall, lower the heat and reduce about a third.
Into the thickened onion cream, stir a heaping tablespoon of Petite Maison White Truffle Mustard. Again, using your wooden spoon, mix well. Then stir in just a teaspoon of WildlyDelicious Black Maple Magic balsamic vinegar. Combine.
Turn the waiting sautéed pork medallion pieces and mushrooms, including the collected liquid, into the white truffle cream sauce. Sprinkle with a little more crushed thyme and add finely chopped parsley (dry will work). Use quite a bit, at least a quarter cup.
Cover and let the flavours marry. Adjust seasoning again.
Now add one or two sliced fresh peaches. If fresh peaches are not available, use tinned peaches (not the juice). Add lots of pepper. Peaches love pepper.
Stir just once to mix.
Cover and serve over plain buttered basmati rice. A wonderful combination.
Pair this dish with Winzertanz, from the Rhineland, my all-time favourite white wine. Gourmet never tasted so good. Takes no time to prepare and can be made ahead but use within a couple of hours. For some reason, this sort of dish changes its chemistry after being refrigerated and is best served freshly made.
And another way to serve:
Prepare wide egg noodles, store-bought or fresh homemade. Drain well and stir melted butter with fresh chiffonade of basil into the pasta. Another day: Serve with fresh-made (instantly cooked) spätzle. Mound with the white truffle mustard pork loin medallions mix.
Alternate:
Drain two tins of Bing cherries, packed in their own juice; do not use the juice. Save the juice for another recipe. Stir the cherries into the mustard sauce instead of using peaches.
For a special gourmet treat, marinate the Bing cherries overnight in Asbach Uralt brandy. Using a small spider spoon, lift out the brandied cherries and sprinkle with a pinch of ground cloves, a pinch of nutmeg and a pinch of allspice, a tiny bit of cinnamon. Stir the cherries into the mustard sauce. This cherry sauce is also good served on a crown roast of lamb, roasted duck breast, even on a roasted stuffed turkey breast (one of my all-time ways to prepare turkey; my recipe that never grows old.
Pork loin escallops in marsala cream sauce
Remove the silver skin on a generous but not large pork loin, using a very thin sharp knife point and push the knife away from you. Remove it all. Don’t miss any, because the silver skin will cause the meat to curl when you sauté it.
Between two sheets of plastic wrap, gently pound and push to stretch the pork medallions. Remove plastic wrap and season the pork loin pieces with salt, pepper, a little thyme and a pinch of nutmeg. Sprinkle the pork with a little dry poultry seasoning.
In a hot skillet with just a little butter, sauté the pork loin medallions and turn only once. Do not overcook. These escallops are fork tender and easily overcooked. Remove from the skillet and rest while you make the sauce.
Deglaze the skillet with a cup of Marsala wine. Let the alcohol burn off, scraping the tiny bits of stuck-on meat. Reduce the wine. It will naturally thicken on medium-high heat. Stir in a quarter cup of your figgy jus from your Asbach Uralt marinating jar. Mash a couple of macerated, brandy marinated black mission figs and add to the sauce. To the very hot sauce, stir in a half cup of half-and-half cream. Remove the sauce from the heat and add a tiny bit of crushed, chopped very fine, fresh sage leaf. Fresh sage is very powerful, so only use a little or it will overtake other flavours.
To add an additional gourmet touch, sear (just once over lightly) tiny white button mushrooms in very hot but not brown butter, with just a pinch of fresh thyme, then salt and pepper when you remove the mushrooms from the skillet. Stir the mushrooms into the hot Marsala cream sauce and drizzle the sauce over the escallops.
Serve with homemade pappardelle pasta or cut sheets of store-bought fresh lasagna noodles into wide strips and simmer al dente in gently boiling water. Salt and pepper. Remember, homemade pasta cooks very quickly. Enjoy! So yum!
© “From Lady Ralston’s Kitchen: A Canadian Contessa Cooks” Turning everyday meal making into a Gourmet Experience
The working title for Carolyne’s Gourmet Recipes cookbook is From Lady Ralston’s Kitchen: A Canadian Contessa Cooks. This kitchen-friendly doyenne has been honoured and referred to as the grande dame of executive real estate in her market area during her 35-year career. She taught gourmet cooking in the mid-70s and wrote a weekly newspaper cooking column, long before gourmet was popular as it is today. Her ebook, Gourmet Cooking – at Home with Carolyne is available here for $5.99 US. Email Carolyne. Scroll down to the comments at each recipe column. Carolyne often adds complimentary “From Lady Ralston’s Kitchen” additional recipes in the Recipes for Realtors Comments section at REM.
