Friday, July 31, 2026

Dodging tornados and rain to get dinner on the table

I've learned that every week lately is a "make it through" this week and it'll get less busy... over and over until you realize it never gets less busy. I oddly thought Summer would be less crazy and yet I was very wrong. I swapped dinner plans Tuesday and Wednesday because I'm still not grilling anything, and burgers aren't something I'm making. I had arranged to make one stop on my way home instead of five... yes, five I told you things were busy... as I was about to leave for home - my phone alerted me there was a tornado warning at home... so I wasn't heading there yet. I waited around for that to clear and drove through the blinding wind and rain to get home to get dinner going to we could still get our girl to where she needed to be on time. As I raced through this recipe we heard word that the storm knocked out the power where she was going so phew! One less thing to do! Good thing, because my pork tenderloins must have been massive because they took like 40 minutes in the oven.... good thing we had extra time! This had a few steps but well worth it! Add some applesauce and delicious! Yes, always applesauce with pork.

Best Baked Pork Tenderloin
1 pkg. pork tenderloins, trimmed (comes with 2 pieces, 2 – 2 ½ lbs. total)
1/4 cup kosher salt
4 cups warm water
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 cup ice cubes
2 tablespoons lemon juice
3 tablespoons butter sliced into 6 pats
Spice Mix
1 TBS EACH chili powder, garlic powder
1 tsp EACH salt, onion powder
1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
1/4 teaspoon pepper
HERBS TO ADD LATER:
1/2 tsp EACH dried parsley, dried basil, dried oregano, dried thyme

Instructions
Preheat oven to 400 °F. Lay two long pieces of foil on a baking sheet – these will be used to fold up each tenderloin separately.
In a gallon-size freezer bag, mix salt with warm water until dissolved. Whisk in apple cider vinegar, brown sugar and ice, followed by pork. Brine for exactly 20 minutes then remove pork from brine, RINSE and pat very dry. The pork becomes mealy if left in the brine any longer.
Whisk together all of the Spice Mix ingredients (not the "Add Later Herbs") in a small bowl. Evenly rub pork all over with spice mix.
Heat 2 tablespoons vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium high heat. When oil is very hot and just smoking, add pork tenderloins, you may need to work in batches. Sear each side of pork until golden, then transfer to foil.
Evenly sprinkle tops of pork tenderloins with remaining herbs (parsley, basil, oregano, thyme) then rub into pork. Evenly drizzle each pork tenderloin with one tablespoon of lemon juice (2 tablespoons total), then top each tenderloin with 3 pats of butter. Bring up the sides of the foil to completely enclose each tenderloin.
Bake at 400 °F until pork registers between 145- and 150-degrees F (63 and 65 degrees C) at the thickest part of the tenderloin, 15-25 minutes depending on thickness. This means the pork will be juicy and slightly pink in the middle. To check the temperature, carefully unwrap the foil, then wrap it back up if it need to continue baking.
When pork is done, loosen foil (so steam can escape) and let stand 5-10 minutes before slicing. Season with additional salt and pepper to taste (I like additional salt) and serve with accumulated butter sauce in the bottom of the foil.

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