Lazy Man's Pasta

"TPC's Lazy Man's Pasta"

What I had on hand:

Stuffed Pork Loin, frozen
1/2 pound of penne
1 tomato
1 can chicken stock
Milk
White wine
Dijon mustard
1 onion
fresh garlic
Rosemary, thyme, basil, homegrown
Kosher salt, ground black pepper, ground red pepper
Grana padano cheese

The objective:

Smash it all together in one dish, and be eating in an hour.

The technique, in the stream of consciousness sort of way it actually happened:

Okay, let's look at what needs to happen here- the pork needs to be thawed and crispy, then simmered until tender. Onions and garlic, sauteed. Pasta, boiled. The sauce, especially because I don't have cream, will need to reduce quite a bit. Fortunately, I've got stuffing (sausage, pine nuts, etc.) that will help thicken and contribute flavor. I don't have a melty kind of cheese, so the grana padano will have to go on at the end.

Here we go. I cut the stuffing out of the pork and sliced it in half, so it would thaw more quickly, and so I could handle it safely. I sliced, then cubed it into bite size pieces to facilitate crisping. Using fairly high heat and some oil, I fried the outside of the pork, then added the onions, stuffing, and garlic and sauteed those as well.

Now how do I cook the pasta in the same dish, I wondered. I deglazed the casserole dish with white wine, then added a bit of mustard. Pushing the pork and onions to one end, I added half the pasta to the bottom of the casserole, covered it with the pork, then added the other half to the other end, and covered that, too. Now I have a layer of raw penne, covered with pork, onions and garlic. Sounds promising.

I need liquid to boil the pasta, and finish thawing the pork. I covered everything with a can of chicken broth (I have homemade stock, but this is just an experiment, remember, and I'm going to reduce it), some milk, lacking cream, so it goes in at the same time so it can reduce too, and some fresh herbs.

I boiled this just until the pasta was softening, and I knew it was going to cook through, then lowered the heat to simmer so I didn't break up the pork, added the chopped tomato and some more fresh basil and cooked everything until the pork was tender and the sauce had reduced. I turned off the heat, stirred in the cheese, and I was good to go!

It was quite good too, the pasta was cooked al dente, the pork was nice and tender, and the sauce picked up a lot of flavor and richness from the sausage, pine nuts and the herbs.

The moral of the story? Technique is your friend. Oh, and keep some mushrooms around, they would have been great in this.