Cooking Light: Spiced Pork Tenderloin with Sautéed Apples

I was really excited to get this month's issue of Cooking Light! It's the Best Recipes of the First 25 Years! 

One of the first items I found while flipping through the issue was the Spiced Pork Tenderloin with Sauteed Apples. Larry's been talking about having sauteed apples - so I thought this would be a good way to try it. 

It's really easy - it's actually listed as a 20 minute recipe - and it is - with one caveat: don't include prep. Slicing a tenderloin, apple and shallots takes about another 20 minutes.

So you mix up a few spices, slice up a 1-lb tenderloin and sprinkle the spices over top. Cooking spray the pan and cook the pork 3 min on each side...remove the pork and keep it warm.

And here are my sliced apples and shallots. I need to buy a mandolin - that slicing apple shiz was for the birds! The annoying thing about the recipe was "2 cups of sliced apples" - well how damn many apples is that? Turns out it was one big Gala.

After you remove the pork, you melt a couple tablespoons of butter and then saute the apples, shallots and a touch of salt. Then after a few minutes, you add some apple cider (we don't like cider, so just used apple juice) and fresh thyme (Meijer was out so I used fresh savory). Cook down a couple minutes and you're done!

And I finally got to use this! I wanted a dutch oven but the Le Creuset's are so expensive - earlier this year I got this puppy at an estate sale for THREE DOLLARS! It's not LC - but hey - it's fine for me!

And voila - pork tenderloin slices with sauteed apples and shallots from Cooking Light!

Spiced Pork Tenderloin with Sautéed Apples

Yield: 4 servings (serving size: 3 pork medallions and about 1/2 cup apple mixture)

Total: 20 Minutes

Ingredients

• 3/8 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground coriander
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper $
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1 pound pork tenderloin, trimmed and cut crosswise into 12 pieces $
• Cooking spray $
• 2 tablespoons butter $
• 2 cups thinly sliced unpeeled Braeburn or Gala apple $
• 1/3 cup thinly sliced shallots
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup apple cider $
• 1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves

Preparation

1. 1. Heat a large cast-iron skillet over medium-high heat. Combine first 5 ingredients; sprinkle spice mixture evenly over pork. Coat pan with cooking spray. Add pork to pan; cook 3 minutes on each side or until desired degree of doneness. Remove pork from pan; keep warm.
2. 2. Melt butter in pan; swirl to coat. Add apple slices, 1/3 cup shallots, and 1/8 teaspoon salt; sauté 4 minutes or until apple starts to brown. Add apple cider to pan, and cook for 2 minutes or until apple is crisp-tender. Stir in thyme leaves. Serve apple mixture with the pork.

Note:

This recipe originally ran in Cooking Light October, 2010 and was updated for the November, 2012 25th anniversary issue.