You Can't Always Make What You Want...

Sorry Mick, Keith and gang...I need to borrow your song title for this post.  You're going to get two recipes for the price of one here.  What I wanted to make is listed first.  It's a recipe we did one night at Flavour Cooking School in Forest Park.  The second recipe is what I made by adapting the first recipe to what I had in the house.  Both were amazing.

1-2 tbsp. grapeseed oil
1-2 beef short ribs per person
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 large onion, diced small
2 medium carrots, diced small
2 celery stalks, diced small
1/2 C. dry white wine
12 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced
1 tbsp. herbs de Provence
2 tbsp. flour
4-6 C. beef stock
1 28oz. can crushed tomatoes
1 bay leaf
1/2 C. Mediterranean black olives, pitted
3 tbsp. roughly chopped fresh parsley

Heat large Dutch oven over medium high heat till hot.  Add oil and swirl to coat.  Season ribs with salt and pepper.  Sear ribs until brown crust forms; 3-5 minutes per side.  Do not over crowd the pan.  Remove meat from the pan.  Pour off all but 2 tbsp. fat from pot.

Add onion, carrots and celery to pot.  Saute until caramelized, 5-7 minutes.  Add wine and deglaze the pan.  Cook until liquid is completely absorbed.  Add garlic, herbs and flour.  Stir to coat vegetables.  Saute 2 minutes to cook off flour taste.

Add 1 C. beef stock slowly, whisking constantly.  Liquid will thicken because of the flour.  Add beef back to pot.

Add tomatoes and bay leaf to pot and then just enough stock to reach 3/4 of the way up the meat.  Bring to a boil.  Reduce heat to low and cover.  Braise stove top or in a 300 degree oven until meat is tender and falling off the bone, approximately 2-2 1/2 hours.  Remove meat and bay leaf from pan, discard bay leaf.  Reduce liquid until it reaches a sauce consistency.  Add olives and heat through.  Serve sauce with meat and garnish with parsley.


So last Sunday I was looking at the recipe above.  I new I didn't have short ribs but I did have giant bone in pork chops.  Chris doesn't like olives but we both like onions and peppers.  I wasn't going to be home to braise it on the stove top but I have my trusty crock pot.  Here is what I made.

6 large bone in pork chops
salt, fresh cracked black pepper and garlic powder to taste
2 tbsp. grapeseed oil

In a large Dutch oven over high heat add grapeseed oil and swirl to coat the pot.  When the pan is screaming hot, add the pork chops one at a time and brown on both sides.  While the meat is browning, chop a large onion, and slice 3 red peppers.  Lay the peppers in the bottom of the crock pot and add the meat as it comes out of the Dutch oven.

Deglaze the pan after the chops are browned with some red wine.  Add some crushed garlic (3-4 cloves), the wine and brown bits from the pan, a 28oz. can of crushed tomatoes, a carton of beef broth and the onion.  Cook on low for 7 hours until meat is falling off the bones.

I served this with some pasta and garlic bread.