Meal No. 412: New Year's Eve

It was good to get back to my kitchen endeavors so that a fine New Year's Eve supper might be put on the table. Apparently, going a whole week without eating much (and likely because I hardly had any beer) was noticeable enough that I was asked earlier today about having lost weight. I've missed my kitchen time with everybody off for the holidays, but at least it had that small pay-off!

The salad starter course was a poached pear salad with walnuts, gorgonzola, and a poached pear vinaigrette.

At the Harris Teeter, I had the butcher give me the special cut of 1-inch blade-cut bone-in pork chops.

The new recipe I was following calls for trimming the chops around the edge and using those morsels to create a good fond in the Dutch oven. Added to this was a mess of thinly-sliced onion, sprigs of thyme, garlic, ginger, bay leaves, red wine, ruby port, chicken stock, allspice, and some salt and pepper.

While the pork chops braised on low heat in the oven for a long time, I got to work on the two sides. It may be the southern boy in me, but I like sweet potatoes along with a meal like this, so I gave them a good long cooking to reach just-shy-of-mush stage.

This was nicely contrasted with Indian-spiced Brussels sprouts:

When it was time to sit down to this meal, I found that my shrunken stomach could only take in just over half of it! Glad I didn't do a soup course, as I'd imagined myself doing.

And I'm glad the dessert was a small one: just small scoops of Bailey's Irish Cream Ice Cream that I'd made earlier in the day.

I did manage to leave room for the drink to mark the arrival of midnight and the start of 2012: a frozen peach bellini:

Happy New Year to all, and best wishes for a fantastic 2012!

---

"Perfect Braised Pork Chops," by Lan Lam in Cook's Illustrated, January & February 2012, p. 14-15.

"Indian-Spiced Brussels Sprouts," from Taste of Home online.