I love this recipe because it gives you two distinct dishes both of which my kids will eat, and both of which are really easy and fast to make but taste like they took hours. The first night, you do need to leave an hour for the pork to roast, but you don’t have to do much else. I can mix it and ask Sunbeam to put it in the oven and it’s ready when I get home.
Night One — Pork Tenderloin Roast
1 standard pork tenderloin roast
1 cup honey
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup orange juice
1 heaping tablespoon thyme
1/2 cup chicken broth
1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Salt and pepper the pork loin. Combrine honey, olive oil, orange juice and thyme, whisk well and pour over meat in roasting pan.
2) Add chicken broth to bottom of pan, put it in the oven.
3) Cook for an hour, basting occassionally with pan liquid.
4) Quickly boil the pan sauce — either in the roasting pan or in a saucepan — until thick and glossy. Serve over pork.
Serve with salad and noodles or mashed potatoes.
Day Two — Honey Pork with Udon Noodles
1/2 cup cilantro
1/4 cup honey
1 small can green chiles
2 cloves garlic
2 tablespoons sesame oil
Leftover pork, cut into strips or shredded, whatever works
1 package udon noodles
1 package shredded carrots
Green onions
Soy sauce
minced ginger (jarred stuff works great, or you can even use pickled.)
1) Run cilantro, honey, chiles through food processor. Add to saute pan and cook until hot. Add pork, heat through, set aside.
2) Cook noodles. When they are hot, and just about cooked, but still a little firm, put them in a big bowl. Pour sesame oil, soy sauce, ginger, and carrots over. Toss until smooth.
3) Pour pork over, top with green onions.
This recipe also works with leftover roasted chicken. It is delicious cold, for lunch.
Is the pork roast a pork TENDERLOIN (aka about 1 pound, long and thin, very little fat) or a pork LOIN (two to three pounds, a relatively thin fat cap)?
I ask because you said “tenderloin”, but I can’t imagine a one-pound tenderloin feeding your family with leftovers, nor can I imagine cookinga tenderloin for a full hour without it turning into a stick of wood…
I also ask because the glaze/sauce sounds DELICIOUS and I wanna try it!!
It is a tenderloin, but I think I used a two-pack when I did this. It’s at a pretty low temp, and I do think it took about an hour, but keep an eye on it and keep basting it.
Yay, thanks!!
Looks like I’m off to Wegmans for some pork!
I’m here to tell you that one can substitute thin spaghetti for udon, chile flakes for actual peppers, candied ginger for fresh, and forget the carrots and scallions (except for the carrots that were in the pork roast) and it still tastes really good. Even better if you let the noodles sit in the hot pan and get all crispy on one side.
Sounds great, Cathy! That’s what I love about recipes. The original version of this called for rotisserie chicken and candied ginger and no carrots. It’s fun to make the recipe work for your own tastes. Did your kids eat it? My kids will, which makes me puffy-red-heart it even more. Whatever keeps the beast at bay.
I just made the Night One recipe, but used a 4-5 lb whole chicken instead of pork. And I smoked it on the grill (put the chicken on a stand, poured the sauce down over it, and let the chicken stock sit under neath the chicken, so that it steamed into the cavity). It was delicious, very moist and there was plenty of sauce – which had an incredible flavor! The honey created a beautiful, golden, shiny skin on the chicken that looked very impressive. Next time, I’ll roast some spring veggies in the oven at the same time, and put some of the sauce on them, too!