Pork Chops with cider and peaches

I was watching "Come dine with me" over the weekend (knitting is the perfect excuse to watch hideous stuff, as one "doesn't really watch"), and there was Gerard, the butcher, doing pork chops in cider. I thought they looked very appealing, and in a rather vague way decided to do some sometime.

Well, what can I tell you? Pork chops were on offer in my supermarket yesterday, so I bought some. As it happens, I have a few cans of cider in the house, too - thank you, Sainsbury delivery man!
I did think about buying apples for a sauce, but already had more fruit than I really needed and didn't want to add to it, so I left the apples where they were and just bought some rosemary and sweet potatoes instead.

I have a bit of an ambivalent relationship with sweet potatoes. In theory, I love them. One of the reasons for loving them is a memory of my best friend's mother. When in secondary school, my best friend was Elena. Her parents were from Spain, having fled the Franco regime to come and live in Germany. Her mother was a fantastic cook, but when she wanted to really spoil herself, she'd have a broiled sweet potatoe.
Most of the times, though, my love for sweet potatoes is theoretical, as I find them too ... well, sweet. But still, I do love them! So I'm on a constant plight to find recipes in which they're done in a way I actually like. Up till yesterday, I had one and a half. Now I've got two and a half, as it turned out that frying and then broiling them in cider is just perfect.

This is what I made them into, and it was GRAND. Easy, too.

Will feed 2 people, goes very well with fresh crusty bread and a leafy salad.

2 pork chops
2 medium sweet potatoes
2 shallots
1 ripe peach
1/2 pint of cider
1 clove garlic
a pinch of chili, salt and pepper
4 twigs of rosemary

Preheat your oven to 200C. Peel and cut the sweet potatoes into about 1/2 inch cubes, the peach into thin slices.
Heat some oil in a pan, fry the sweet potatoes for about 3 - 5 minutes, season with chili, salt and pepper. Take out of the pan, leaving the oil in. Line a small-ish baking sheet with the rosemary, set the sweet potatoe cubes on top and stick it in the oven so they get a bit of a headstart (about 10 minutes).
Season the pork chops with salt and pepper and fry them in the pan, just browning them on the outside, then take them out and set them aside.
Fry the shallots, garlic and peach slices in the pan until they start to brown, pour in the cider and let it boil up for a couple of minutes.
Take the baking tray out of the oven, place the pork chops on it amidst, not on top of, the sweet potatoes. Pour the shallot-peach-cider mixture over them, and put back into the oven for about 10-15 more minutes.
Enjoy.

Sour dough - the full monty

This is what my starter looks like after a week in the fridge. Sad. But - don't let it fool you! It's a very lively little starter, this!






With some TLC and flour, it will turn into this lovely brown bread:



This is how the magic is done:

You will need:

2 cups of sour dough starter
2 cups of plain white flour (and some to dust your working space)
2 cups of luke-warm water
3 cups of strong, brown flour
salt

Take the starter out of the fridge. If it's separated (don't panic, that's perfectly normal, the watery layer on top is the so-called "hooch"), give it a good shake/stir and let it come to room temperature. Then pour it into a bowl, and mix with two cups of plain white flour and 2 cups of tepid water, adding one at a time. Cover with a clean towel or cling film and let it sit for a couple of hours. Once it's starting to show bubbles, it's ready for the next step:


Take off 2 cups of the mixture and put back in the (by now washed and thoroughly drained) container your starter lives in. Pop back in the fridge. This is now good to be ignored for up to a week. Should you not want to make bread after a week, take it out, let it come to room temparature, take off half and mix with one cup of flour and one cup of water ("feed"). Then you can put it back into the fridge. Wash, rinse, repeat weekly. Some bakeries proud themselves by claiming to have used the same starter for more than a hundred years!

Mix in 3 cups of strong, brown bread flour and about 4 pinches (equals roughly half a teaspoon) of salt. I do that using a wooden spoon, and switch to hand-kneading once the dough starts to form a ball. You can of course do this in your kitchen aid ... anyhoo, the dough's ready when it's just stopped being sticky, but is still pretty soft. Like this:

Cover tightly with cling film and put in the fridge overnight. Well, that is, if you prefer your fresh bread for breakfast ... you can leave it outside for proofing, of course. It will, depending on your starter and the room temperature take 3 - 12 hours for it to go up, it should about double it's size. Test by poking it with a finger - if the dent stays and doesn't pop out again it's done. In the winter, I sometimes stick it in the oven to proof - turn it on for a minute or two, and then off again. It should be just handwarm (press hand against glass panel in the door to test - if it's too hot for your hand, it's too hot for the dough!).

In the morning, take the dough out and let it come to room temperature. Give it a quick knead on a dusted workspace ... if you prefer your bread to be fine-crumbed, knead up to 15 minutes. The less you knead at this stage, the more rustic the bread will be ( read: bigger holes).



Shape into form, and put on baking tray lined with dusted baking parchment. Put a little bowl of water into the oven and preheat the oven to 220C. Let the dough proof one final time (about 30 minutes usually do the trick), then slash with a very sharp knife, and bake for about 40 - 50 minutes, until it's nicely browned and sounds hollow when you tap it's underside.
Done!