March 17-19 Pork Loin Roast with Orange Sauce

March 17   St Patrick's Day Shindig at The Neighbours
March 18   Went out for Oysters
March 19   Pork loin in an herbed orange sauce


Thursday night was a great dinner party with The Neighbours. They made a delicious beef stew, home made bread with some sort of fabulous soft butter/garlic/asiago and we ate my Black and Tan cupcakes for dessert. Green beer, green white wine and a rousing game of Yahtzee with an honest to goodness young Irish couple - what more can you ask for?

 I saw this recipe for the pork loin from Pip and Debby when it made top 9 on Foodbuzz and I knew that I wanted to make it because not only did it sound really great, it would provide enough meat for Sunday night's dinner as well. I already had an herbed pork loin in the freezer from Supperworks and although the flavours were much different than the simple olive oil/garlic marinade in the recipe I was using, I thought that the brown sugar, herb rub that I used at Supperworks would taste great with the orange sauce. The plan is to use the leftover pork to make paninis on Sunday night unless Shack talks me into going out for dinner or something like he tends to do. I am going to try to stay strong and just say no to dinner out. He is recuperating from falling on a night stick after getting hit in the head with a piano stool (don't ask) and by dinner time he gets really antsy and just wants to go out somewhere but I will tempt him with delicious pig.

Oh, Little Shack made me photograph this piece of pork fat that looked just like a horse head for you to see and it does, indeed, look like a horse head, complete with dark, flowing mane.
Weird.

Roasted Pork Loin with Orange Herb Sauce
adapted from this recipe on pip and debby
Preheat the oven to 400F and put a rack in the upper third of the oven

1 pork loin rubbed with brown sugar and herbs - I can't recall exactly what the rub mixture was but anything would go with this sauce to be honest

1 tsp oil

Heat an oven proof pan over med heat, add the oil and brown the pork loin on all sides. Once it's all nicely browned, add:
 1 cup of orange juice
1/2 cup of chicken broth
1/2 cup of white wine
1 sprig rosemary
about 1 tbls good dried oregano
A couple of grinds of black pepper

When that come to the boil, put the pan into the oven and roast for about 35 or 40 minutes or until the meat is 145 degrees

When the meat is done, remove the pan from the oven and take out the pork to rest on the cutting board while you finish the sauce. Strain the liquid from the pan into a saucepan and reduce to 1/2 cup or  for about 15 minutes. I took it off the heat and whisked in about a a tbls of butter just to make the sauce just a bit richer.