Balsamic-glazed Pork Chops with Vegetable Pilaf

Okay, this could have been a really gorgeous dinner, but then I made a kindersuprise-coloured pilaf (instead of the much lovelier sounding "Argula-Basil Pilaf" the pork recipe suggested), over-reduced my glaze to almost a paste, and served it with some... rustic sliced vegetables instead of... I don't know, piling it up 3 inches tall, pork atop rice with spears of asparagus fanned out behind it.

Tasted good, though.

The pilaf is just a lot of cut-up vegetables that I needed to use - red pepper, a single lonely carrot, some red onion I didn't want to toss out, and peas from the freezer - cooked in with the rice. It was impossibly easy and very tasty, if a bit low brow with its bright colours. And of course the cucumber and tomato is my favourite vegetable side.

The pork recipe was remarkably simple, and quick, but I shouldn't be surprised by that since the recipe came from a Rachael Ray cookbook. I did over-reduce my glaze, but it tasted wonderful, even with dried herbs in place of fresh and the cheapest of balsamic vinegars (sorry, I just can't afford any... $80/100ml vinegar). Probably the tastiness was due in large part to the dab of butter you add at the end. It was all shiny and sticky and lovely and worth making again in the future.


This, by the way, is my 175th entry here. Which is a little scary to think of, somehow, that what started as a way to kind of trade photos with a friend has turned into something this big. (Not big in the blogosphere, just in my life, but I enjoy it, anyway.)