Pork Chops with Fire-Roasted Tomatillo Sauce and Corn Bread

This may have been the best overall meal yet! In addition to the pork chops with tomatillo sauce, we had the best corn bread I have ever tasted. The corn bread had kernels of roasted corn along with chopped jalapeno chile and roasted red bell pepper. It was really unbelievable. Cooked in a cast iron skillet over indirect heat on the grill.

The tomatillo sauce is made by grilling 8 tomatillos and a poblano chile and putting them into the food processor with bacon, garlic, onion, cilantro, salt, pepper and sugar. The only problem we had was the poblano chile - first we ask which of the six different chiles in the store was the poblano. Next problemo with the poblano was the directions say to cook it 6-8 minutes over medium heat turning occasionally until blistered but still holding its shape and then "remove and discard the skin, stem and seeds. On the stem and seed front we were AOK. As to the skin, well, I think the time estimate was short by about 20 minutes. Either that or our poblano was defective. Anyway, it did not peel very easily at all. I will have to figure that out before trying to make this sauce again. It slowed things down a lot. I was not all that impressed with the flavor of the sauce anyway - give me some good ol fashion BBQ sauce on my pork chops! Full disclosure - others at the meal liked the sauce so don't go on my word. I may be biased against it from spending an hour trying to peel the @#$%@!# poblano.

More adventures with the food processor (aka Fat Albert). I put the tomatillo, poblano, garlic, cilantro, etc. into Fat A and turned it on. Huge whirring noise but no actual grinding going on. My friend, Mark Heffron, who was reading the recipe for me and looking over my shoulder said patiently, "maybe you need to put a blade in there." It reminded me of the story of the old guy who buys a chain saw and tries it out for a week before he takes it back to the store. "This thing doesn't cut worth a damn. I have been working day and night for a week and barely have been able to cut any wood." The man at the shop takes the saw and looks it over. Seems ok but he decides to start it up to test. He does and the old man says "Hey, what's that noise?" I could have run Fat Albert for a week and it still would not have made a dent in the tomatillos!

Dessert was Berry Biscotti Crisp. Also very yummy. When I make it again, I will add more crisp. The flavor was fantastic. It is not too hard to make either. We did not dare leave it on the grill too long because it was in glass pie plate and I was afraid it would break. We put it in long enough to get a little smokey flavor going and then finished in the oven at 375.

Mark and Jayne Heffron, our dearest friends, came over to sample the grill'n. We also were joined by our oldest son Roy and our youngest son Charlie who had two friends come help eat the feast. It was lots of fun from beginning to end. Jayne brought and cooked kohlrabi which was very good and worked really well with the pork. She also made a fabulous dish of cooked greens with soy sauce and garlic and lots of yummy stuff. Both dishes were spectacular additions. I will let her comment and tell you about how she prepared them. All I can say is they were MMMMMMM GOOD!

Tonight is Mint and Garlic Chicken on the rotisserie. A new adventure!

I have been lucky so far as we have not had much snow this winter so I have been able to grill without too much need for shoveling! That could change Tuesday as they are predicting 11 inches. We will see. Our friends and family on the East Coast have certainly had more than their fair share of weather this winter. We hope you are all warm and safe!

Mark