Chef`s Log 14 March 2009 Discount Genuardi`s Pork Chops

Chef’s Log 14 March 2009
Discount Genuardi’s Pork Chops
Market Meltdown. This time we did not even go to Wegmans. We went to Genuardi’s, the
neighborhood supermarket, and bought “supersaver card” pork chops and chicken. I gave my
chops a bath in some Jack Daniels from a bottle that has been in the house since forever, and
then applied a thick coat of Dry Jamaican Jerk Rub. Jean skipped the hot spice and used only
garlic. I cooked them for 24 minutes over maple wood smoke.
We served the pork chops with Japonica, a mixture of wild rice and organic red rice, and simple
steamed broccoli. I had a bottle of Lost Abbey Devotion, a Belgian-style Blond, but with more
hops than would traditionally be used, and well-able to stand up to, even be heard over, the
resonant sweetness and almost painful heat of the dry rub.
The recipe is now a go-to favorite, as effective with a thick cut supermarket pork chop or a bone
in double cut Duroc from Derek’s Main Line Prime, and is important enough that I reproduce it
here. It is a modification of Steve Raichlan’s Jamaican Dry Jerk Rub (Barbecue Bible, page
176). I doubled the recipe, changed the peppers that provide the heat, and increased the garlic,
the cinnamon, the allspice, and the nutmeg by 50%. More garlic works in almost any grilling
recipe. I made sure that this one had complex heat rather than just pain, and I increased the
sweet spices. But Raichlan is the master, the best there is, and I recommend you start with his
recipes unchanged, and then modify them to suit your preferences and your available ingredients.
3 Tablespoons Dundicut Chili Pepper Powder (a variant of Scotch Bonnet, not quite as
hot, easier for me to find than Scotch bonnet or habanero chile powder)
2 Piquin Peppers (deadly hot and definitely optional!)
3 Tablespoons Crushed Cayenne Pepper
4 Tablespoons freeze-dried chives
2 Tablespoons dried onion flakes
3 Tablespoons dried garlic flakes (50% more than Raichlan uses)
2 Tablespoons coarse sea salt
4 teaspoons ground coriander
4 teaspoons ground ginger
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
3 teaspoons ground allspice (50% more than Raichlan uses)
1½ teaspoons ground cinnamon (50% more than Raichlan uses)
½ teaspoon ground gloves
¾ teaspoon ground nutmeg (50% more than Raichlan uses)
Nothing else to report. The mouse who lives in the grill did not make an appearance. The
dessert, a spoonful of Haagen Dazs Reserve Amazon Valley Chocolate and of Reserve Fleur de
Sel Caramel ice creams, took no special work from us and are not shown here. The dessert and
the beer really were splurges, as ice cream and beer go. The pork chops were, by comparison,
almost free. And with the sweet smoke of the maple and the sweet and fiery intensity of the rub,
the chops were perfect; the double-thick cut allowed me to crust them, char them, smoke them,
and still keep them moist.
ekc