Wednesday 20 June 2012

Pork Medallions with Broad Beans

Following on from the success of my "Tapas" post the other day, I now present for your delectation the latest offering from the Mark's Veg Plot kitchen... I perhaps hadn't realised that so many of my gardening blogger-buddies are quite so interested in food too - but I'm very pleased that they are! I'm also following up on my recent post about Broad Beans, because I know that many readers in the UK and elsewhere will be picking their first harvests of this delicious vegetable round about now.

This is Medallions of Pork Tenderloin, in a creamy green peppercorn sauce, with baby Broad Beans, served on a bed of minted pea couscous.


You might think it sounds a bit fancy, but I assure you that it is dead easy to make, costs a modest amount, and can be ready in minutes. This is how:-

For this dish I used a cut of meat called pork fillet, otherwise known as tenderloin. It is a surprisingly cheap cut. Enough meat for two people costs about £4 in a supermarket. The cut is long and thin, so for my dish I cut it into twelve "medallions" approximately 2" thick.  I covered my medallions with a generous grinding of fresh black pepper and left them to stand in the fridge for a couple of hours.

After preparing the meat I shelled the peas and podded the Broad Beans. Both of these were young and tender examples of their kind. Not, regrettably, from my own garden - though I'm working towards that. Mine will be ready in about two or three weeks' time, but I was just too impatient. As soon as I saw them in the shops I wanted them immediately!




About half an hour before eating time I started cooking. First job was to brown the meat in some oil in a large frying-pan:


While this was happening I cooked and drained the Broad Beans. When they are young they only take a few minutes to cook. After they were done I put my fresh peas into a pan of boiling water and cooked them for literally two minutes.

Now I made the couscous. I added 300ml of boiling water to 150g of "quick cook" couscous and left it to stand for a few minutes before adding the cooked peas and a slack handful of chopped fresh Mint (from the garden!).

By now the meat was cooked through and browned on both sides, so I removed it from the pan and kept it temporarily on a warm plate while I made the sauce.


The sauce was made in the same pan in which I browned the meat, thus making maximum use of the meat juices (which accounts for its rather "mushroomy" colour too). The sauce started with a tub of Elmlea low-fat cream with the addition of two tablespoonsful of Creme Fraiche to thicken it. Into this went a dessertspoonful of green peppercorns, and about a teaspoonful of finely chopped Winter Savory (again from the garden), a herb that goes incredibly well with Broad Beans. 

[Note: green peppercorns are slightly crunchy - though not hard like the dried black ones - so you might wish to lightly crush them before adding them to your dish. They add a pleasantly mild peppery note - just the right sort of thing for a sauce like mine!]

When the sauce was bubbling away nicely I added the pre-cooked Broad Beans and then the meat once more:


At this stage the pork doesn't really need any more cooking. You just need to warm it up in the sauce, which only takes a minute or two.

Next thing - fluff-up the couscous with a fork to make sure it has absorbed all the water.


Now we're ready to plate-up... Adding a sprig of Savory as a cheffy garnish.


So there we have it: Pork Tenderloin medallions with creamy green peppercorn sauce...


Wine recommendation: a robust Rosé would be a perfect accompaniment to this dish.

16 comments:

  1. That looks delicious. I'm hoping to have my first broad beans in about a week. We can't get them from the stores here and I've never seen them at the farmers market. I guess they aren't very New England for some reason.

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  2. Seriously good lip smacking post Mark

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  3. oh my god are you kidding? my broad beans are at least a month away from production... your medallions are stunning, I love the creamy sauce, really really exactly what I want for dinner tonight!

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  4. Very interesting Mark and I still have the tenderloins from our pig left too...

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  5. Looks good! Though I'll skip the mint!

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  6. This is just my kind of meal. Broad beans and mint are brilliant together. I can't wait to start picking mine...so soon!

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  7. I would like to have some of your's dinner: haven't had fresh broad beans in ages. I can't grow any beans here, too hot. Today I pulled out bean weeds as it started to dry out with no harvest. Temperature at 18.00 was 40C. I think we are stepping in a dry and harvestless time until September...

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  8. Your beans and peas pods are getting there. My second batch of summer savory has failed to sprout and I really hope this third batch does. I can barely wait to eat it with beans.

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  9. It looks delicious. I do hope I like the broad beans I've grown when I eventually get to taste them.

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  10. I'm always a bit concerned at recipes with lots of cream etc (My cholestrol is on the high side - genetic I think) so was interested in the low fat alternative. I often replace cream with low fat yoghurt. The recipe looks delicious.

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  11. Yum, I think, is the only word for this! I do like all things porky and broad beans are to die for.

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  12. What did you add to the sauce to make it look yellow - or is that just the photography. Whatever you did I looks really YUM

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  13. Elaine, I think it is a combination of factors: I took the photos in the artificially-lit kitchen in the evening; I also used the meat-juices in the sauce which made it darker than it would have been if I had just used the Elmlea, and I did use a little oil for browning the meat and that was probably Rapeseed oil, though I don't rightly remember.

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  14. I'll be filing that recipe away for when my broadbeans are productive. They are barely out of the ground, right now. My boy doesn't eat pork product of any kind, so it will all be for me!!

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