A little known fact about myself is that when Greg asks me what I want for my
birthday dinner (the tradition is that the birthday person picks what is for dinner),
I almost always pick Pork Steaks.
Seriously, much as I enjoy eating out, and even though I will then choose a good
seafood dish such as salmon or sea bass, Pork Steaks have always been, and remain,
my favourite for home cooked goodness.
Probably since Greg knows how to barbecue them just right.
There are a couple of rules when barbecuing Pork Steaks.
First:
Pork Steaks need to be barbecued.
Seriously.
No other method will work. Don’t even try.
Second:
Pork Steaks deserve to be marinated.
Of course, you can just throw them on the ‘que and they will be just fine.
You’ll have to find a decent sauce, but, ya, they are ok.
But, they are a cut of meat that really want to be soaked in a nice,
tenderizing, flavouring marinade that will, not only help tenderize the meat,
but leave enough sauce on the meat to be carmelized when grilled.
Third:
This is important:
Pork Steaks want to be seared on a pre-heated BBQ, then have
direct low heat and indirect medium heat applied.
This allows the crisp outer edges, as well as ensuring that the
inner marbling gets rendered without drying out the steak.
Now, I lucked out this week. It wasn’t even my birthday, and Greg put Pork Steaks on sale.
Yippee!
Was what my inside voice said when I saw the copy for the ad in my inbox two weeks ago.
I quickly threw Pork Steaks on our menu
and started thinking about how to prepare them.
Funny story – I’ve had this recipe for Tangy Grilled Pork Steaks on our website for years. But haven’t tried it yet.
So, last week, when I was re-writing recipes, instead of throwing that one away with all
the other recipes I have not personally tested, I did this amazing thing.
I put two thoughts together
and decided to use the recipe this week so I could make it my own and keep it on the site.
If it passed the ultimate taste testers, that is.
Greg and I are extremely discerning when it comes to tasting.
Recipe calls for normal stuff that I have in my kitchen, thankfully.
No single item trips to the grocery store with an ungrateful toddler. Yeah!
Brown sugar, curry, garlic, soy sauce, tomato sauce and onion. Easy stuff.
Of course, I substituted pasta sauce for tomato sauce, but that’s pretty sane, right?
And I didn’t really add the red wine, it just looked nice in the picture.
Although, now that I mention it, maybe I should have…. hmmm..
Oh, well, next time.
And curry, I have on hand at all times to make my mom’s Chicken Divan recipe
(which will be added soon to the recipe pages, I just need to make it to get some
decent pictures for the recipe card. It will probably warrant it’s own blog entry, too.
Don’t worry. It’s coming…)
So, yup, everything on hand. I brought it all to a simmer like the recipe told me too.
And let it marinate for a couple hours. Probably should have started it earlier and
given it more time, but it’s March Break and I was lucky to start at 3:00.
2 hours is good.
Now, about that “direct low heat and indirect medium heat applied” thing I mentioned earlier.
What that means is that you pre-heat the BBQ to medium-high at first.
Then, toss the steaks on the grill.
But then, you turn the burner right under the steaks to medium-low or low
(you know your barbeque best – you want some flame, but not enough
to crisp the sugars and burn too quickly)
and leave the far burner on medium or medium high to keep the
overall heat high to render the marbling.
Do all that, and then flip the steaks once you see crispy edges and
juices settling on the steaks, maybe about 10 minutes
5- 10 more minutes, and we’re ready.
This marinade added zing and sweet.
I’m going to be bossy and tell you you really should try it.
Crispy, juicy, caramelized goodness.
