Pork Chops with Horseradish Cream Sauce

Pan-roasted Pork Chops
2- 2" bone in pork chops
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp fresh cracked pepper
1/2 tsp allspice
1/2 tsp dried marjoram
1 Tbl. olive oil
2 carrots- chopped
1 celery stick- chopped
1 bay leaf
2 c. chopped brussel sprouts

1. Preheat oven to 425. Bring the chops to room temperature and rub with the salt, pepper, allspice and marjoram. Heat a saute pan to medium high, add in the oil and when the oil's hot but not yet smoking, add the chops. Let brown on all sides.

2. Add the carrots, celery and bay leaf around the chops in the pan, then over that add the brussel sprouts. Bake in the oven for 10-12 minutes, then remove and cover the pork. Pour out and reserve 1/4-1/2 cup of the pan juices. Keep roasting the vegetables for another 15-20 minutes until tender.

Horseradish Cream Sauce
1 c. heavy cream
1/4- 1/2 c. of the reserved pan juice (depending on how much you have, add in 1/2-3/4 c. chicken or beef stock)
1/4 c. grated horseradish
1/4 c. diced apple
2 Tbl. finely chopped scallions (original recipe calls for chives)
1/2 tsp dry mustard
Salt to taste

1. Combine all the ingredients in a sauce pan and let simmer over a low heat for 30 minutes. Taste for and add salt. You can serve with the apples and scallions for a chunkier sauce or strain them out with a sieve.

Mustard Cream Sauce

I love how a sauce can really elevate a dish. For whatever reason, a (mostly) simple liquid drizzled over a piece of chicken or salmon or a crawfish cake can bring in a certain elegance, and give a dish depth. That's why they're great for dinner parties. With this one particular recipe, where I cheated by buying pre-made crawfish cakes, the sauce helped tie in a homemade element to personalize the meal. And  honestly, you can't go wrong with a mustard sauce in almost any situation... mustard just equals delicious in a way that few condiments can exemplify.

I don't make sauces this complex often because they usually involve butter, cream and other fatty ingredients, but sometimes you have to splurge. Though even just some reduced white wine with mustard and chicken stock would make a delicious topping as well, it's the special occasion feeling that allows me to indulge with cream. And over a simply grilled chicken breast or broiled salmon fillet it isn't as much of a caloric splurge as it may seem.

Mustard Marsala Duck Legs

Ok, so maybe duck legs aren't so every day, but if you don't have the hook up like I do with the cutest old men butcher's down in the West Village, you can just use chicken legs. Or chicken breasts, or veal, or pork chops. In fact you can use just about any white meat or foul you want. Because the secret is in the sauce. And it's so easy, and yet so delicious.

Farmers Market Find: Thai Basil

Those wonderful, rare weekends where I'm in actually in town with not too much planned go a little like this: am spin, hit up the farmers market, become entirely overwhelmed and purchase something completely random, walk through the park afterwards contemplating what the h I am going to do with said random item, get home, make a delicious meal with previously mentioned random item, if it's nice out I'll usually sit in my backyard with a glass of wine and good book, and usually end the night going out with friends or having a quiet movie night while relaxing at home. Sounds nice, right? I wish I had more of these... some day I suppose.

This time the random purchase was thai basil, a wonderfully fragrant herb you've probably had in Thai or any southern Asian cooking. It's also quite beautiful and after washing I thought it would be nice to place the stems in a vase and let the delicious fragrance waft through my apartment. I still have last nights dinner leftovers to eat so I decided to make a thai basil marinade, throw on some chicken breasts, wrap it all up in individual plastic bags and keep in the freezer for a night I don't feel like all out cooking. I love doing this, for nights I get home late from work, or spin, or am just out, and while it's not exactly a novel idea, it does fit the needs of a busy girl to a T.

In lieu of cooking...

I actually did cook tonight, I'm just exhausted. I have the pictures and the recipe all ready to go, but would rather just veg on my couch and watch a very frightening TV show (The Walking Dead on AMC). Which is ok, right? But here's a funny little diagram about learning to cook to hold you over.

Ok, ok. I made lamb tonight. I marinaded it in a bastardization of my mom's famous Easter lamb marinade and roasted it. And thank goodness for thinking ahead, yesterday me. If not I'd definitely be eating some form of take out tonight. Anyways, I served it with some gently sauteed veggies like onion, chard and zucchini and served over minted whole wheat couscous (that'd be regular whole wheat couscous with some fresh chopped mint mixed in). And topped with this really truly delicious mint mascarpone sauce that I tweaked from a Giada de Laurentiis recipe.

A Mushroom Worth it's Weight in Gold: The Chanterelle

One of the best and most frustrating things about my neighborhood is my grocery store. I tend to refer to it as a fancy market... it's expensive, not very large, always full of the typical Park Slope parents and their overly large strollers or hyperactive toddlers wandering at random. But it's also full of some truly amazing things, cases of cheese, attentive butchers, every combination of spice and vinegar flavor you can imagine... and naturally it's pretty expensive ($30 olive oil anyone?). So for staples I go to my corner deli, for the ingredients that make a meal special I go to the fancy market.And one of those special ingredients I'm always willing to splurge on are mushrooms. They have your typical ones- button, portabella, crimini, but they also have those mushrooms you see only on shows like The Barefoot Contessa, or that really fancy restaurant. Maitake (hen of the woods), oyster, morel, lobster, chanterelle, etc. I like to try them all whenever I can afford them and this week it was chanterelles.

Chanterelle's are very high in Vitamin C and D as well as potassium. The golden chanterelles have a light apricot color. Meaty, chewy and eggy in texture, they work best sauteed, simply or with some cream, cooking alcohol, and chicken broth. Historically they were considered a culinary delicacy, typically served to nobility. They have also been called Queen of the Forest and Golden Chanterelle.