Ingredients
6 pork chops
1 bottle of sweet and sour sauce
1 cup of water
10 potatoes (russet or yellow, peeled and cut into cubes)
1 stick of salted butter melted
1 cup of cream
½ cup of buttermilk or regular milk
1 tsp sesame seeds
2 Tbs wasabi powder
2 tbs canola oil
Directions:
Place potatoes in a large pot of salted boiling water and boil until soft. While boiling, prepare the pork chops
Salt and pepper the pork chops generously
Heat a skillet or frying pan (I prefer non stick for this) on medium high heat until hot with the canola oil.
Place pork chops 3 at a time into pan and fry 4 -5 mins on each side until brown. They do not need to be fully cooked, just nicely seared and partially cooked.
Remove chops from pan and set aside.
Place water in pork chop pan and scrape the fond from the bottom of the pan. Add the bottle of sweet and sour sauce, stirring and reduce heat to medium. Add pork chops back into pan (you can stack them on top of each other) and cover with a lid. Cook an additional 5 – 7 mins, occasionally rotating chops until done in the center. Turn off heat and leave covered.
Drain potatoes and mash, adding butter and cream. Add the wasabi powder. Add remaining milk/buttermilk until desired consistency of mash is reached.
Serve pork chops over the wasabi mash. Spoon additional pan sauce over the top and sprinkle with sesame seeds to finish.
Variations – You can use teriyaki, kung pao or any flavor of Asian sauce you like. You can also sub out the pork with chicken or other protein. Also, you can use my previous mashed potato recipe, simply sub out the garlic powder for the wasabi. Honestly, if you had any leftover mashed potatoes, this is a good way to use them up and add a totally different flavor! Serve with any other side you like.
The Story:
Take an american classic of pork chops and mashed potatoes and change it up I noticed a similar fusion recipe a while back and figured I would give it a try since the grocery was having pork chops on sale. The original used teriyaki or a homemade version, but I am a bit lazy sometimes and I had a bottled sauce on hand. I also happened to have gotten a large bag of wasabi powder several months ago so I could make my own wasabi paste. I was purchasing the little tubes of it for a ridiculous price, and happened to be at our local “cash and carry” or restaurant grocery store when I saw this large bag of the powder for a really good price.( I think cash and carry is now called smart foodservice, and there are many locations in the western states. I am sure the rest of the US has a similar store in your area.) We served this with some steamed broccoli sprinkled with sesame seeds. The end result was delicious and certainly is going to be done again in our house.