Pork Loin Roast w/ Apple Sage Corn Bread Stuffing- Elegant!

This pork recipe offers an elegant entrée for special occasions. “Butterflying” the pork loin roast makes it a large, thinner rectangle. It’s then pounded with a meat hammer to further tenderize the meat. The surface is spread with a corn bread stuffing mixture, and cooked at higher oven heat for 10 minutes, then at a quite low temperature for the remainder.

Use the Corn Bread with Apple and Sage recipe for the stuffing (a delicious accompaniment to a meal in its own right). A 3-4 lb. pork loin should serve 6-8.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 eggs
• 1/4 c. chicken stock (or water)
• 4 c. crumbled Cornbread With Apple Sage (about half a recipe)
• 3-4 lb. boneless pork loin
• 2 TBS. fresh, chopped sage (or 1 TBS. dry)

PREPARATION

1. Follow the recipe for Corn Bread with Apple and Sage. Set the corn bread aside.

2. To a bowl, add: > 2 eggs > 1/4 c. chicken stock (or water) > 4 c. crumbled Apple Sage Cornbread (about half a recipe)

3. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Prepare the pork loin. Use: > 3-4 lb. boneless pork loin

4. To butterfly the meat, lay it fat-side down, and make a cut down the long, middle part. Do not cut all the way through! Cut a third of the meat open, as if “unfolding” a three-fold menu, creating a new layer of meat as it opens. Make another cut through the other third of the meat, opening it as if “unfolding” a menu, by cutting through the layer of meat. The goal is to make a somewhat round pork loin into a larger rectangle of meat that’s about an inch or so in thickness. Once it is of rectangular shape, pound with a meat hammer to further even out the thickness (which tenderizes the meat as well).

5. Season the meat; spread lightly with: > 2 TBS. fresh, chopped sage (or 1 TBS. dry)

6. Spread the corn bread stuffing on next, to about an inch from the edges. Roll it up like a jelly-roll, and tie the roast with kitchen string, every 2 inches or so.

7. Cook the roast at 450 degrees for 10 minutes only, then at 250 degrees for 50 minutes or so, until internal temperature reads 140-150 degrees with a meat thermometer.
Let the roast rest on a cutting board for 10 minutes or so. Remove any clunky droppings from the pan; deglaze the pan, adding some chicken stock, if available, to help loosen the flavors stuck to the pan. Remove the twine from the pork; slice 1/2 inches thick, and serve with the “au jus” (drippings from the pan).