Cook-Along: Recipe for Pork Chops and Scalloped Potatoes Casserole

A recipe for pork chops with scalloped potatoes in a casserole, how bad could that be? This week’s Cook-Along recipe is adapted from The New Basics Cookbook, by Julee Rosso & Sheila Lukins (of Silver Palate fame). The Accidental Locavore had a few lovely local pork chops and was looking for a new recipe for pork chops, since I revert to the pork chops with mustard and cornichons so often, this seemed like a good use for the chops and the end of farmer Paul’s great potatoes.

As the recipe says, “this is hearty winter fare”. The prep work is pretty easy, it just needs an hour plus to cook. The recipe serves 6, however I cut it in half when I made it.

• 2 cups heavy cream
• 1 clove garlic, thinly sliced
• 2 tablespoons whole grain mustard
• 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard (I only had Dijon so that’s what I used, it worked fine, but the whole grain would have been nice for the contrast)
• 2 teaspoons dried thyme leaves (not having any dried thyme, and since the fresh was under a foot of snow, I tossed in some herbs de Provence)
• 3 cups thinly sliced potatoes
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
  
• 6 loin pork chops
• 1/4 cups dry white wine (you’re using this to deglaze the pan, so feel free to use red wine, chicken or vegetable broth, or even water)
• 1 cup thinly sliced onion
• 2 tablespoons chopped Italian parsley
• Salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Bring the cream and garlic to a boil in a large saucepan, you want width here rather than depth. Reduce the heat and simmer until reduced by a third, 5-8 minutes. Add both mustards, and the thyme, and mix well. Set aside. The recipe calls for you to bring a large pot of water to a boil and cook the potatoes for 30 seconds, then drain them and dry on paper towels.  I did it, but I’m not sure what the reason for it is, the potatoes get lots of cooking time with the pork chops. You could probably skip that step.

Melt the butter in a skillet and brown the pork chops over medium heat for 2 minutes on each side. I salted and peppered the chops before sauteing them, force of habit. Remove the chops from the skillet and set aside. Add the wine to the pan, and simmer for 30 seconds, scraping up any brown bits. In a large baking dish that will hold the chops in a single layer, layer half the potatoes and onions. Lay the pork chops over them, and pour the pan juices over the chops. Top with the rest of the potatoes and onions. Carefully pour the cream mixture over the top, to evenly cover. If it seems a little thick, add a little more cream. Sprinkle with the parsley and pepper ( I skipped this step as there was no parsley, and the pork chops were cooked with salt and pepper). Bake for 1 1/4 hours. If the top isn’t brown, stick it under the broiler to brown it. Serve and enjoy.

My rating: 4 stars. These were really good. Instead of the butter, I cut about 3 strips of bacon into 1/2″ lardons, and cooked them over medium high heat to render the fat, then I added the pork chops to brown them. Not sure how much that added to the dish, but it didn’t hurt. What would have been a great addition would have been some sauteed mushrooms, so take that under advisement.

Frank’s rating: 4 stars. “Definitely a winter dish.” He agreed about the mushrooms, and added that this is a dish he’d like to have again. What do you think?