Pork Chops with Mustard Crumbs and Steamed Broccoli with Caper Brown Butter

Don't like making pork chops because you're afraid they'll be dry? Pork Chops with Mustard Crumbs is a great way to forestall that problem, so common with this lean meat. This recipe is quick, seals in moisture when you're baking (because of the mustard/crumb layer), and is seasonal because of the lovely minced sage. I got a special kick out of making it because I used my homemade rye bread for the crumbs. M.and E. were visiting when I made this, and again, E. was just through the roof about these chops.

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Steamed Broccoli with Caper Brown Butter is the second recipe in this book that utilizes fried capers, and I had the same problem with both recipes, which is that when I followed the directions exactly I ended up with crispy, burned capers. It's a great idea, just poorly executed because by the time the butter is browned the capers are overdone. I had to make the sauce twice, which only irritates me. But the second time around it was quite tasty--butter, lightly fried capers, lemon juice, salt and pepper, which really could be tossed with anything (I'm thinking pan-fried sole/flounder/trout would be pretty nice). Unfortunately the subtle joy of this sauce was lost on Dr. and Mrs. S. because broccoli is not one of their favorite vegetables, but they both still ate it--good troopers both of them.

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Every time I post I wish I had a digital camera to upload my own photos--hopefully Santa will bring me one for Christmas. In the meantime, I'll continue to search for photos online that come close to what I'm talking about. And if you have a spare digital camera just kicking around unused and unloved, toss it my way!