Stir-Fried Noodles with Roast Pork

Leftover recipes are the best.  When the thought is already made for you and you can create 2 unique meals with one or more shared element, it makes for a great week!  This noodle bowl was really good with our left over pork tenderloin and filling.  Enjoy:

Recipe Adapted from Food and Wine January 2013 Issue

Ingredients

1. 8 ounces Baby Bella Mushrooms, sliced
2. 12 ounces fresh Chinese noodles or linguine
3. 1/4 cup chicken broth
4. 3 tablespoons soy sauce
5. 1 1/2 teaspoons unseasoned rice vinegar
6. 1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
7. 1 teaspoon Chinese chile-garlic sauce
8. Pinch of sugar
9. 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
10. 1 tablespoon minced ginger
11. 2 scallions, thinly sliced, plus more for garnish
12. 1/2 pound leftover Asian-Brined Pork Loin or other roast pork, cut into thin strips
13. Sliced fresh hot red chiles, for garnish

Directions

• In a saucepan of boiling water, cook the noodles until al dente, 3 minutes; drain and rinse the noodles. In a bowl, combine the broth, soy sauce, vinegar, sesame oil, chile-garlic sauce and sugar.
• In a large nonstick skillet, heat the vegetable oil. Add the ginger and mushrooms and cook over high heat, stirring, for 3 minutes. Add the noodles and scallions and stir-fry until lightly browned, 5 minutes. Add the pork and sauce and cook over moderate heat, tossing until the sauce is absorbed, 3 minutes. Transfer the noodles to a platter, garnish with scallions and chiles and serve.

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Our Baby Shower- the Sweets!

Nothing is sweeter then being showered by all of those you love!  We were so blessed to have had our baby shower hosted by my mom and sister- they truly put together my dream shower, it was lovely, simple, beautiful, and delicious!  My mom made the most delectable macaroons, a cake was made by the Cakery with my Pinterest inspired Whale topper- gorgeous AND delicious, Laura spoiled me by making her gorgeous cake pops ( she made them for our wedding shower too- she’s so talented!!)  We are so excited, and now very stocked up and ready to welcome our baby boy to the world!

Asian-Brined Pork Loin

This last month has gone by so fast, and the fact we don’t have many recipes to show for it is telling.  We have been enjoying a lot of date nights and eating out too much!  Our kitchen is starting to notice, and we are making a pact to be better at making food and picking our recipes out for the week to stay on track.  ( Chicken stock is being made as we speak for some delicious kale and white bean soup!)  This recipe was pulled from an old Food and Wine magazine before we sent it to the recycling bin ( nesting much!?).  Jason loves anything brined and we haven’t had much experience with it so he pulled this and we gave it a try.  All of the ingredients sounded wonderful and smelled devine, we followed the directions to a T but used tenderloins instead of a bone in 6-pound roast.  We figured the flavors would be even more intense with the smaller scale meat selection, but were kinda not blown away by it considering all that goodness.  We determined that we would recommend the following:  squeeze out the oranges in to the brine rather than leave them sliced and zest some rind in to the bowl, chop up those chiles really well so the flavor more readily escapes, and mince the ginger- all so the flavors don’t have to soak out, they are already bam out and in your face.  Otherwise, the pork was tender and cooked perfectly, we served it first with asparagus, cilantro, limes and brown rice- then the best part was all the extra meat was ready to use for a LEFTOVER RECIPE, which I will be posting separately: Stir Fried noodles with Roast Pork.

RECIPE ADAPTED FROM FOOD AND WINE JANUARY 2013

ACTIVE: 30 MIN | TOTAL TIME: 2 HRS PLUS OVERNIGHT BRINING  |  SERVINGS: 8 TO 10

1 1/2 cups mirin

1 1/2 cups low-sodium soy sauce

4 ounces fresh ginger, minced

10 small dried red chiles, chopped

1 orange, halved and juiced and zested

2 tablespoons toasted sesame oil

8 cups cold water

2- 3-pound, pork tenderloins

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

Directions:

• In a large pot or bowl with lid, combine the mirin, soy sauce, minced ginger, chopped chiles, orange juice/ zest and rind, sesame oil and water. Add the pork roast, cover and refrigerate overnight.
• Preheat the oven to 350°. Drain the pork and let it come to room temperature. Pat dry. In a medium, flameproof roasting pan, heat the vegetable oil. Add the pork roast and cook over moderate heat, turning occasionally, until browned all over, about 10 minutes. Transfer the tenderloins to the oven, on a rack in a fasting pan, and roast for about 40-45 minutes, or until an instant-read thermometer inserted in the thickest part of the meat registers 135°. Cover the pork very loosely with foil and let rest for 15 minutes.
• Slice it thinly before serving.

Pending Parents must get out to eat as much as possible….

As the title suggests, we are feeling the urge to really enjoy our “freedom” before have a baby, this isn’t helping the “saving money” factor, but we are finding balance!Pictured above is our all time favorite burger, it’s perfect, read more about it when we posted here.  Usually this is a 1-2 hour wait but as I am rather round these days, they pulled some strings and 10 minutes after we put our names on a list, we were ordering up our food!  Pictured: craft beer, root beer on tap and the classic Double Burger… nom nom nom

Above: Korean tacos at En Hakkore