Marinated Pork Loin and Hamburgers a la Diana

What a wonderful weekend! Some of my closest friend were in town for different reasons, but we were all able to get together this past weekend for a fabulous beach day and a couple of late night talks. Kita and her three girls were here from Colorado, Joey and her daughter for Portland, Maine and Karima from my old stomping ground, Brooklyn. There is nothing like being with your dearest friends in the world and even though we haven't seen each other in a while it felt like just yesterday we were drinking at Lucky Johnny's or covering up holes in our dorm room walls with posters left over from our butt rocker party. (Maybe I can find a picture of that to post!)

It was a great way to let off some steam too before I had to start digging into my work week this week. It went too quickly. But I did make dinner on Friday and Saturday nights and Kita was requesting I post the recipes so here we go:

On Friday, I grilled pork loin on the grill that I had marinated for several hours in a soy, dry sherry mixture that I found on the Food Network site. I think it turned out really well, but some of our younger guests thought it smelled like alcohol so maybe it would have been best to make something a little simpler for the under 21 in the group. They did eat it though so I am not sure if it tasted better than it smelled or if they were just being polite.

Here is the recipe I used:

2 pound pork loin
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup dry sherry
1/2 cup honey
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil (the original calls for vegetable oil, but I liked the way the olive oil worked out)
2 tablespoons fresh orange juice
1 1/2 tablespoons fresh thyme (the original calls for rosemary, but they didn't have any at the supermarket so I used thyme)
1 tablespoon minced onion (I thought I had the shallot the original recipe called for but it was bad, so I substituted onion and it was fine, but shallot probably would have been better.)1
1 teaspoon minced fresh ginger

I patted the pork loin dry and placed it in a gallon zip lock bag. In a medium bowl, whisk together the soy sauce, sherry, honey, vinegar, oil, and juice. Add the thyme, onion, and ginger and mix well. Pour the mixture into the zip lock, covering the pork loin. Marinate for as long as possible but at least two hours.

Preheat the grill. Remove the pork loin from the bag leaving the marinade in the bag. Place them on the grill and cook for about 18 minutes (depending on the size, it could be a little more or a little less. I use a thermometer to make sure it is done properly.) When it is finished, remove from the grill and let stand for 10 minutes.

In the meantime, pour the marinade into a skillet and heat it up to a slow simmer for about 10 minutes.

Slice the pork loin, arrange on a plate and pour the heated marinade over the slices. Yum!

The following night I made hamburgers. Damien is really the best one at making them, but this is how I do it:

Hamburgers a la Diana
3 pounds organic ground beef (after the whole NY Times e. coli article, I'm all about organic ground beef)
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon ground black pepper
3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
2 tablespoons steak sauce (I used Smith and Wollensky's)
1/4 cup Italian bread crumbs

Put the ground beef in a large bowl. Add the salt, pepper, Worcestershire sauce, steak sauce and bread crumbs to the beef. Use your hands to mix as well as you can. I don't really measure the ingredients when I do it so these are all approximate. You can use as much or as little of them depending on your taste. The goal is a moist and tasty burger.

Once it is well mixed, make about 10-12 hamburger patties. Preheat the grill to about 450 - 500 degrees. Place the patties straight on the grill and cook for 3 minutes per side for medium (but this of course depends on the thickness of the patties so you can check one to make sure it's cooked properly.)

You can add some cheese to the burgers when they are close to finished and I like to toast french style hamburger rolls from the bakery section that are much better than the usual hamburger buns you get in the bread section.

I also use ground turkey sometimes and they are just as good.

Yankees Suck Meatloaf

I'm gonna have to write this quickly. My power supply doesn't seem to be working properly. Then I remembered that I found Baz sucking on the end of it today. I hope it is not another casualty of Baz the drooling electronics fanatic. We've already lost a Blackberry and a couple of remote controls.

But, I am back at it today. After taking Baz to his 9 month doctor's appointment, and waiting out an hour nap in the parking lot of the Surfside Publix, I went food shopping and then came home and cooked a nice meal.

I was in the mood for meatloaf. So, I sort of made up my own recipe and added a glaze that I liked from a Food Network recipe. It turned out pretty well.

Here's what I did:

Yankees Suck Meatloaf
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 cloves garlic, pressed or diced
1 small onion
1 small carrots
1/2 green pepper
1 small Roma tomato
4 small mushrooms
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon thyme
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 tablespoon bread crumbs
1 slice of bread
1 pound ground beef (I used organic ground beef after the New York Times article)
1 egg

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Finely dice the carrot, onion, tomato and mushrooms. Put the olive oil in a large saute pan and heat over high heat. Add the garlic and saute until it starts to brown. Add the rest of the vegetables and saute until soft and the onion is translucent. Set aside to cool a little bit.

Combine the dry ingredients and put in a large bowl. Add the ground beef and break up the slice of bread and use your hands to mix it with the meat and spices. Add the sauteed vegetables and egg. Mix all ingredients together with your hands.

Form the mixture into a loaf either using a loaf pan or your hands. Put the loaf in the middle of a baking sheet and put it in the oven.

After ten minutes, add this glaze which I got from Alton Brown on the Food Network site:

Combine 1/2 cup of ketcup, 1 tablespoon of honey, 1 teaspoon of ground cumin, a dash of Worcestershire sauce, a dash of hot sauce. Mix well.

Cover the meatloaf with this glaze and continue cooking until a meat thermometer reads that it is 165 degrees in several places. This takes about 1 hour of cooking.

I served it with mashed potatoes and some steamed broccoli. It was really good.

Oh and I call it Yankees Suck Meatloaf because the Yankees suck.

Picadillo

Today I think I'll make Picadillo for dinner. This is a traditional Cuban dish that I ate about a million times growing up and have since adapted into my own version. It's made with ground beef and vegetables and served over white rice. I always throw in a side dish of fried plantains which have become really easy to make now that Goya packages a frozen version (look for "platanos maduros") that just needs to be warmed up in the microwave. It's just so hard to find fresh plantains that are the right ripeness. Goya's are always perfect and so freakin' easy.

It's also nice to remember to take the ground beef out of the freezer sometime during the day. I hate having to defrost things last minute.

To make picadillo you need to start with a sofrito - a very popular start to many Cuban meals. My mom and grandma don't use tomato paste and wine, but I think it has a nicer flavor when you do it this way.

Sofrito
1 medium onion
1 medium green pepper
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 clove of garlic (although I usually throw in at least a second cuz I love garlic)
1 can of tomato paste
1/4 cup white wine
water
Optional: Sazon Goya with Saffron packet


Chop up the onion and green peppers into small diced pieces. Heat up the olive oil in a medium sized saucepan over medium heat.



Squeeze a peeled garlic clove through a garlic press (I like this one from Hoffritz) into the heating oil. When it starts to brown, add the chopped onion and peppers.





Cook the garlic, onions and peppers over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until the onions are translucent and the peppers are soft. This take about 7 or 8 minutes. Try not to under cook the vegetables but don't let them get too dry either.

Lower the heat to a lower setting and stir in the can of tomato paste. Then add the white wine and stir until it starts bubbling. You might want to add a bit more wine or water to make the consistency a little looser. It shouldn't be soupy but it should be soft and wet.


If I have it, I add in a packet of Sazon Goya with saffron, a seasoning you can find in the Goya, Latin food section of a supermarket. This just gives it an added zing and a beautiful color.




This is your sofrito.

Now, for the rest of the Picadillo.

Picadillo
Sofrito (see above)
1 pound ground beef (I've never tried turkey or other ground meats, but I bet they'd be fine, just not very Cuban)
salt and pepper
1 teaspoon cumin
1 bay leaf
1/4 cup chopped green olives with pimentos
1/2 cup raisins
Optional: a couple of chipotle peppers canned in adobo sauce

You'll add the ground beef to the sofrito you just made, breaking up with your hands as you add it. Season it by sprinkling a light layer of salt and pepper over all of the beef/sofrito mixture. Then add the cumin and bay leaf, olives and raisins. I know raisins are an odd addition, so if it freaks you a bit, just leave it out. But, I gotta say, they're my favorite part of picadillo.

I also have been adding a couple of chopped up chipotle peppers that have been canned in adobo sauce. I've been adding them to just about everything actually. (They are superb in chili!) This makes it a little spicy and probably makes it taste more Mexican than Cuban. I buy it at this bodega on the corner since they don't seem to carry it at Publix, my local supermarket (which is surprising since they have everything.)

Cook the sofrito/beef mixture over low/medium heat for about 20 minutes.

In the meantime, make some white rice. And don't forget to put the fried plantains in the microwave just before you are ready to serve. They take about 3 1/2 minutes to heat up well.

I serve individual portions of this dish in shallow bowls. I start with the rice, put a good amount of the picadillo on top and a couple of sweet plantains on the side. Delicious. Even my gringo husband calls it a favorite!

***I'd also like to send a shout out to my friend, Becky, who went back to work today. I know it's gonna be a hard day for you, but it's got to get easier. I am sure you are much more upset than Olivia. She's probably having a blast playing with her new friends. And you get to have adult conversations and skip a couple of nasty diaper changes!