Cooking with the Bubba: A series of original recipes #8- Black Forest Grille

A change of pace. A little German style cooking done on the grill. Smoked pork chops with red potatos, sauerkraut and grilled apples. Nice fall fare.

Ingredients (for two): 2 smoked pork chops, One 15 oz. can of sauerkraut, 3 medium red bliss potatos, 1 very large apple (the 20 ounce variety if you can find them), spicey German mustard or your own favorite, crushed black pepper corns, 1 teaspoon caraway seeds, 1/2 teaspoon allspice, 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon, 1 teaspoon sea or kosher salt, 1 teaspoon brown sugar, 1/2 medium onion, juice of half a lemon, 1 tablespoon canola, corn, vegetable (whatever) cooking oil.

Preparation: Rub mustard liberally onto the pork chops, then pound in the crushed black pepper corns. You don't need to really pound them in. The palm of your hand will do. Put them aside and now, slice the onion into thin rings. Add the rings to a preheated medium sized pan along with the cooking oil. Fry until slightly browned, then add the sauerkraut, caraway seeds, and brown sugar along with a little water (or orange juice if you'd like). Stir well, cover and simmer, checking occasionally for liquid content. Add more water or juice if needed. You can simmer the kraut as long as you like while preparing the grill. Par boil the potatos for about 15 minutes or microwave with a little water for 10 minutes, let cool then slice in halves, and rub with oil and salt. Cut the apple into half inch thick slices (perpendicular to the core). Now on a cutting board, remove the core from each slice and sprinkle with the allspice and cinnamon. Rub the spices into the apple slices, along with a little bit of cooking oil.

Cooking: It's time to grill. Start with a pre-heated very hot grill to make those lovely grill marks. Add the chops, potatos and apples then crank it down to medium or low and cook for about 15 minutes, turning once. Like ham, smoked pork chops are precooked so they don't need as much grill time as a raw pork chop would.

Serve: Over a generous portion of that sauerkraut you've been simmering all this time with an Oktoberfest beer to wash it all down. HOME