Confessions of a Chronic Non-Measurer: Garlic and Rosemary Rubbed Pork Loin Roast

I’m going to be up front here. I rarely follow a recipe. I hardly ever measure. I cook with the mystical powers of “well, that feels about right.” And it works for me.

I love to cook. It took about two years of marriage to really get into the groove of cooking with disaster after disaster ending in the trash with a shrug and a “tonight’s a dinner out night.” I learned a lot through trial and error. I learned what spices we like and in what quantity, so with years of disasters and successes behind me, I feel confident in using the technical measurements of a “bit here”, a “swig there”, and a “dash of that.”

Some recipes lend themselves better to this type of cooking. When I am cooking something I have repeatedly, it makes eyeing it easier, but there are a lot of forgiving recipes out there that allow for experimentation and changes without needing the recipe police to approve it.

This recipe is one of those recipes. Don’t like rosemary? Switch it out for something else. Aren’t a big fan of garlic? Reduce it and add olive oil to add moisture. Like the flavor of lemon with your meat? Add some lemon juice to the mixture. Need to make a holiday feel? Pile this roast on apple slices and let the oven fill your house with the scents of sweet and spice.

The amazing thing is, no matter what you do, this roast turns out top notch and ready for the guest meal table. It is so easy to prepare that it is a no brainer that pork loin roasts are a common holiday menu item. It is classy, delicious, and juicy, mixing it well with other holiday favorites.

Recipe: Garlic and Rosemary Rubbed Pork Loin Roast

Ingredients

4 large garlic cloves, pressed

A nice heap (4 teaspoons) fresh rosemary

Shake it until it feels right (1 1/2 teaspoons) coarse salt

Grind a couple times (1/2 teaspoon) ground pepper

1 2 1/2 lb. pastured pork loin roast

1. Preheat oven to 400°F.

2. Mix seasoning ingredients into a small bowl. Rub the mixture all over the pork.

3. Place pork, fat side down, into roasting pan (covered in aluminum foil for easy clean up).

4. Roast pork for 30 minutes. Turn roast fat side up.

5. Roast until thermometer registers 155F. I roasted mine approximately 25 minutes more. You can take the roast out earlier than 155F if you like your roasts to be on the medium rare side. I didn’t mind roasting mine to 155F because it still turned out juicy and not dry at all.

6. Remove from oven and let stand for 10 minutes.

Looking for quality meats for your holiday festivities? Our farm store is stocked with pork loin roasts, ham steaks, prime rib roasts and more. Treat yourself this holiday season. Our store hours are Saturdays, 9 am - 2 pm, and Wednesdays, 3 pm - 8 pm.

Sheet Pan Ham Dinner for 2

As the holidays approach, I am always thinking up ways to make an easy, quick meal for my hubby and I that celebrates the season, but doesn’t result in a horrifying amount of dishes to wash up when I’m ready to sit on the couch and relax. This meal ticks so many of my preferred recipe boxes: easy, little clean up, and satisfyingly delicious. The recipe I used said this meal was for two, but with our thick pastured pork ham steaks and the nice amount of veggies, this could easily be made for a family of four. We definitely had leftovers, which we used for breakfast the next day! I’ll show you how after the recipe.

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Sheet Pan Ham Dinner for Two

Ingredients

Apple-Mustard Sauce

• 1 tablespoon apple butter

• 1 tablespoon dijon mustard

• 1 tablespoon orange juice

Mashed Potatoes

• 1 pound russet potatoes (1 medium potato)

• 1/4 teaspoon salt

• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper

• 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

• 1/2 teaspoon dry parsley

• 1/2 teaspoon dry chives

• 1 tablespoon butter

• 3/4 cup milk (hot)

Carrots

• 3/4 pound small/young carrots (cut in half)

• 1 tablespoon olive oil

• 1/2 lemon juice

• 1/4 teaspoon dry thyme

• 1/4 teaspoon dry rosemary

• 1/8 teaspoon salt

Brussel Sprouts

• 3/4 pound Brussels sprouts (cleaned and cut in half)

• 1 tablespoon olive oil

• 1/8 teaspoon salt

Ham

• 2 individual ham steaks

• apple slices

• orange slices

Recipe Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 400F.

2. Apple Mustard Sauce: In a small ramekin, combine the apple butter, mustard, and orange juice. Mix together.

3. Mashed Potatoes: Peel and dice potatoes to approximately 1/2-1 inch in size. Place potatoes in a ceramic dish in 1 layer. Sprinkle with spices and add pieces of butter. Heat up milk and pour over potatoes. Cover potatoes with foil and stick in oven immediately to get the potatoes cooking.

4. Veggies and Sheet Pan Assemblage

   1. Place orange slices onto the sheet pan and cover with apple slices. Place the ham steaks on top.

   2. Add carrots to the sheet pan and drizzle with olive oil, add spices and mix together.

   3. Add the cut brussel sprouts to the sheet pan, drizzle with olive oil and season.

   4. Place ramekin with apple mustard on sheet pan.

   5. Take potatoes out of oven and place on the sheet pan.

   6. Bake the entire sheet for 40 minutes.

5. Remove sheet from oven and take foil off of the potatoes. Mash with fork or potato masher. It will be thin with liquid at first, but the potatoes will absorb the milk and get thick. If your potatoes are not soft enough yet, stick them in the microwave for a few minutes to cook the rest of the way.

And here is the finished result!

Tate and I even had leftovers! I probably could have just made one ham steak for the two of us, but I didn’t mind the extras when we had breakfast the next day. We had finished off all the carrots and brussel sprouts, but we had a little bit of the mashed potatoes and ham steak leftover. So, we had fried potato patties, ham steak, scrapple and eggs for breakfast on Sunday morning. Talk about a he-man breakfast! That breakfast lasted me till dinner time. If you are looking for quality meats, our ham, scrapple, and other pastured pork cuts are available at our farm store. Stop by on Saturdays and Wednesdays and we will help you come up with a meal plan!