Making Maddie's Pork Chops

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Making Maddie's Pork Chops
Here's my interpretation of an outstanding dish that was developed by Daikon in honour of his niece. That little factoid alone makes it perfect for this forum, since we are very much all about preserving and sharing family food history here; however, the story doesn't end there. The fact that it is even here on this forum is a fortuitous thing; and its story is one of the reasons why I love the internet, and discussion forums in particular. I always find it amazing how, when free and open discussion is encouraged, the most interesting tangents come up in a topic, tangents that can take on a life of their own, grow legs and really run to the goal line. Check this out.... 
Not long ago, we were discussing an interesting-looking recipe that a member of another forum developed for apple-cinnamon sausage links:
http://foodsoftheworld.activeboards.net/forum_posts.asp?TID=1640&title=apple-cinnamon-breakfast-links
One of the listed components was "apple cider molasses," which is essentially apple cider that has been simmered and reduced to a thick, caramelised, molasses-like consistency. It is an impressive-looking recipe, and I'm eager to try it; I even boiled down a gallon of apple cider to a pint of "molasses" in anticipation of my attempt, but I am getting off-topic here....
The thing is that this particular discussion came up at a time when we had just recently been discussing how finicky kids can be when it comes to eating the meals that are prepared for them:
http://foodsoftheworld.activeboards.net/forum_posts.asp?TID=1474&title=weeknights-at-the-tasunkawitko-house
As any adult (with children in his/her life) knows, it can be sometimes be a true challenge to get kids to eat some of their meals, and it is often frustrating. 
As it happened, Daikon came across both these topics, and offered his thoughts on them, which you can read by following the links above, if you want to. The important thing is that the two conversations converged on a single point: a pork chop dish that Daikon developed, much beloved by his niece, named Maddie, to the point where they became known in the family as "Maddie's Pork Chops."
Reading his description of this dish, I was immediately interested, and requested a few more details about it. Daikon graciously accomodated and shared a detailed description, complete with a shopping list and method for Maddie's Pork Chops:
http://foodsoftheworld.activeboards.net/forum_posts.asp?TID=1644&title=maddies-pork-chops
At the first opportunity, I took this outline and ran with it - let's see how I did!
For the convenience of the reader, here is the ingredients list, as given by Daikon:

 Trimmed pork chops of some sort (ideally thick-cut, but you can accommodate cheap, thin ones with skill
Orange juice (enough to come about halfway up the side of the chops when they are in the skillet)
Rosemary (lots -- at least the equivalent of a 1-1/2" sprig per chop, and more for garnish)
Minced garlic (I don't know how much.  How much do you like?  The recipe can tolerate quite a bit.)
Thyme
Dry white wine
Olive oil
Butter
*Not on the list but mentioned later are shallots, salt and pepper
Armed with these ingredients and a brief - but detailed - description, I got to work.
Unfortunately, I had one of my famous camera SNAFUs during this project: Somehow, my camera setting were altered to take pictures at 640x480 pixels, rather than my usual resolution, which is large enough to allow for editing, rotating, cropping etc. before re-sizing down to 800x600 pixels. Because of this, some of the resulting pictures are slightly fuzzy or pixelated, but all things considered, they turned out very well over-all. Here we go....
As always, we begin with "the goods:"
We are talking about some really easy ingredients here!
A couple of notes: In the photo above, I included dried rosemary, along with fresh, in case it turned out that I would need more than I had; as it turned out, I had just enough though, so no worries. Also, next to the rosemary, the ziplock bag of herbs you see is summer savory, which is similar to thyme, but milder, in deference to The Beautiful Mrs. Tas, who is not fond of thyme. Finally, the two oranges shown above were used for garnish. For the wine, I used a chardonnay that, while not fancy, has worked well for me with many other cooking projects. As for the pork chops themselves, I didn't measure them, but they were slightly thinner than ideal for this dish; I believe they were 3/4 of an inch, but can't swear to it. An inch or more would have been better, but these were just fine.
This is a very humble dish, if one were to simply look at the ingredients; however, the whole is worth so much more than the sum of its parts; all that is needed is a little time and effort. Anticipating a great result, I began my prep work by crushing and mincing the garlic:
I used four cloves that were on the large side, and this seemed about right.
When the garlic was taken care of, I stripped all but two of the rosemary sprigs and gave the leaves a rough chop to release their magic:
Mrs. Tas is a bit suspicious of rosemary, finding it too similar to pine needles for her to really enjoy; because of this, I was a bit nervous about using this wonderful herb, but as I will show later, I was able to mitigate any damage that the stiff texture might cause to her evaluation of the dish.
Next, I peeled and finely-chopped the shallots:
I love shallots, but rarely have the opportunity to use them. At first, I was going to use all four of the shallots I had for this, but after I chopped two, it looked like just the right amount, so I went with two.
This was essentially all the prep work necessary, So I heated a couple tablespoons each of butter and olive oil:
While the fat heated up, I patted the chops dry, then lightly salted and peppered them, then tossed them onto the hot cast iron to develop a sear:
After a few short minutes, I flipped the chops over and saw to my dismay that, even though they were developing a beautiful sear, they were also curling up a bit:
So I placed my newly-acquired cast-iron trivet (from Lodge Manufacturing) on top of them to act as a weight:
This trivet is advertised as quite the versatile little unit; aside from keeping meats flat while cooking, one can also use it as a panini press, to keep roasts out of the liquids in the bottom of a pan or Dutch oven, for pitting olives, or for any number of uses - or even for its intended purpose, which is to set hot cast-iron cookware on!
As you can see here, the trivet did its job quite well, and when I pulled the chops off the heat, I had a nice sear:
If I would have thought to use it at the beginning, the crust would have been more even and the chops wouldn't have been curled, but no worries; we're well on our way to some real goodness here!
After removing the chops, I poured off most of the excess fat, then de-glazed with about a cup-and-a half of the chardonnay, scraping the bits and fond from the bottom of the pan. I also reduced the heat a little and added the garlic (left) and shallots:
I continued stirring and scraping, reducing au sec until the liquid in the pan had begun to carmelise and was nearly dry:
I then added the rosemary:
Now came the time to really find out what I could do; I added the pork chops back to the pan, and poured in enough orange juice to come halfway up the sides of the chops:
As you can see, this really produced some beautiful colour combinations; in fact they were so nice, I took another picture:
From this point, I brought the liquids to a boil, then reduced the heat to a gentle simmer and braised the pork chops until I judged them to be done, turning a couple of times to coat with the wonderful, citrussy goodness. I had to guesstimate the cooking time for the chops, and went with about 15 minutes; as it turns out, it was probably a little too long, but not by much. I probably should have covered them during this time, but didn't, as I was trying to keep an eye on them; thankfully, braising is a very forgiving technique.
When the chops seemed done, I removed them once again, and then put the spurs to the liquids in the pan, in order to reduce them down to a wonderful, rich, tangy sauce:
When the liquid had reduced by a little more than half, transforming into a beautiful, carmelised ambrosia, I tested it with a spoon and happily found the sauce clinging to it quite nicely. Rounding the corner for the home stretch, I reduced heat to the lowest setting and added a scant tablespoon's worth of summer savory, then returned the pork chops back to the pan, turning them a couple-three times in order to coat them with toasted-orange deliciousness:
Meanwhile, as the sauce reduced and carmelised just a tiny little bit more, I sliced the oranges as evenly as I could, gave the middle slices a cut and a twist (the only real "fancy" garnish that I know), and put my plates together:
I've "known" Daikon for a few years on another forum, and over that time, I've come to think of him as a bit of a mentor; because of this, I really wanted to put some effort into this and make as nice a presentation as I could, in order to do honour both to him and his niece:
For a side dish, I served garlic-herbed Parmesan mashed potatoes; my "herbs" were actually a healthy shake of Mrs. Dash, but no worries, the potatoes came out very well:
When the plates seemed ready, I turned my attention back to the pork chops and their sauce:
Everything was looking just right, so I scraped the thickened sauce off the sides of the pan, stirred it back into the whole and set about plating: 
You may recall my earlier mention of Mrs. Tas's dislike of rosemary leaves in dishes; because of this, I decided to strain the sauce and catch the lion's share of leaves, leaving just a few for their colour and visual effect:
The carmelised orange sauce, which looked wonderful on the pork chops, also made a very effective and tasty topping for the potatoes:
How did the dish taste? One simple word: outstanding! I was completely, 100% blown away by the flavours I created, as well as the easy, yet significant little things that made this such an extraordinary meal. The pork chops, to my chagrin, were slightly over-done, but not by much - the moist heat of the braising kept them tender and flavourful. The few, yet well-balanced, flavours involved in this endeavour all worked together to play on each other and bring out the best in everything, from the sweet/sour/tangy/rich orange reduction, to the savory herbs, to the bit of spice from the black pepper, way back at the beginning of this journey. Everything came together for wonderful flavour, which was enhanced by the stunning (compared to my usual efforts) attention to detail when plating; a feast for the eyes as well as the palate:
My sincere gratitude goes out to Daikon for sharing this small bit of his family story, and I remain impressed with the way things can turn out, even on unexpected paths; were it not for a couple of chance observations on a couple of totally un-related subjects, I might never have known this splendid dish. Bringing this creation to life based on his descriptions was one of the few times that I've felt the way a true chef must feel, and I was inspired by the experience. I hope that, with this post, I've done fair justice to Daikon's dish, and that each and every person reading this is similarly inspired to try Maddie's Pork Chops!