It Started with Pork Chops

Feast your eyes on this delicious soup!  It is split peas, barley, and lentils in a wonderful broth from pork bones simmered overnight in the small Crock-Pot.  I added a sofrito of sautéed onions/celery/carrots just before serving, and it was super delicious.

But let me tell you about the time before the broth.  Safeway had very nice pork chops on sale for $.88 a pound.  I got a package of six large ones for $4.65.  When I got home from the grocery store, I trotted out the six-quart Nesco roaster and plopped all of them right into the pan.  No need to find room in the refrigerator or freezer for them.

They sizzled for a few hours, and at dinnertime I took most of the meat off the bones of two of them, and put it in a pan with some watered-down BBQ sauce.  We like the essence of BBQ sauce, but not the harshness of having it straight on meat. I let the pieces stew in that liquid for about half an hour, and they nicely absorbed the ambience without becoming strong and sticky – just the way we like them.

I served them forth with potato medallions with cheese and roasted red peppers, and some spinach on the side.  This was a delightful dinner.  To further ease the work and cleanup involved, I took the bones and put them in the small Crock-Pot with about a quart of water and let it simmer on low all night long, and far into the next morning.

This little exercise produced a nice amount of really fabulous broth and an additional pile of meat, which went into the soup.  The finished soup was then available for a fabulous and super easy lunch, but cried out for cornbread.  So I made these five muffins filled with dried cranberries, and a regular cornbread with pepper jack cheese bits scattered on top.  I thought the batter would have enveloped the cheese more, but it did just what you see.

I baked the muffins in the muffin tin that was provided with the Cuisinart Oven Central, and then baked the regular cornbread in the square pan provided.  They baked rather quickly, and  came right out of the pan on the first try.

A bonus is that I have a container of the BBQ’d pork that is enough to make another lunch of pulled pork sandwiches for us!