For the longest time, I feared the kitchen. Growing up, an incident while cooking bacon pushed me away from the kitchen. And I had not returned until recently. I would hide under the guise that I didn’t know how to cook. Now, I’ll admit, I didn’t know the first thing about how to regain my comfortableness in the kitchen. But, as my wife has told me time and time again “if you can read, you can cook.”
I’ll be the first to tell you that my cooking game is mediocre at best. But, it is a skill that I’m developing, as apparent by many kitchen mistakes and occasional trips to the ER (we’ll discuss the later in another post) due to kitchen accidents. When I do get it right, however, it is something to praise!
I recently tried my hand at creating a Parmesan pork chop meal that looked so good on paper. When it was all done my eyes were not disappointed! The pork chops were amazing. Even though the full meal didn’t turn out the way I’d planned, The pork chops alone was a huge success.
Following a recipient from The food network, I used two eggs, a cup of Italian Bread crumbs, 3/4 cups Parmesan cheese(the recipes called for freshly grated, but I used shredded), salt, pepper and 2 Tablespoons of vegetable oil. Working with 6 pieces of pork chops, after rinsing them off, I coated with the Parmesan cheese. Being careful not to remove the coat of cheese I then used a paper towel to pat dry then coat with egg. I added the salt and pepper to my bread crumbs and from the eggs, the pork chops were placed into the bread crumbs. Then grilled each for about 4-6 minutes per side. And finally, bon appétit!
The rest of the meal was going to be a rice and vegetable blend, but, the brown rice didn’t want to work with me. After multiple attempts, I’m sad to say that my rice was burned and killed on the stove! I ended up suggesting pork chop sandwiches…without the bread!
Corey Stokes 