Chipotle Lime Pork Tenderloin

OK. Here we go! 1st recipe! Yea!

Now, this one is a mix of a stolen Food Network recipe with a little made up stuff too. I was originally going to make a pork tenderloin stuffed with dried apples but kinda messed up my carving. Got up a little early this hot Saturday morning in Chicago to start some prep work and may not have been quite awake yet. I wanted to make a couple of small incisions in the tenderloin to butterfly it to make it nice and thin for stuffing. But - as those of you who know me - I ain't too sharp when I don't have a belly full of coffee. I decided to cut all the way through the tenderloin - not once, but twice! So now I have some lovely pork strips. Well... now we gotta fix us some pork. Whipped up a little smokey, hot and citrusy marinade and played a quick 9 holes with my boy. Turned out great. Jennie-pie loved it. I served it with a Gorgonzola Shallot Mushroom Lime sauce (recipe in the next post), roasted sweet potato rounds and roasted asparagus. A nice Pinot Grigio went well with this dish.

Here's what I did:

Chipotle Lime Pork Tenderloin

1 3-4lb pork tenderloin
1 sm. can of chipotle chilies with adobo sauce
garlic powder
onion powder
salt
pepper
juice of 3 limes
juice of 1 orange
honey
fresh rosemary
fresh cilantro
4 slices of maple bacon
olive oil

Marinade: In an extra large zip lock bag, combine the lime juice (2 only - save 1 for later), orange juice, chilies with adobo sauce, garlic powder, onion powder, honey, salt and pepper. Add the pork tenderloin. Shake it up nicely, squeeze out the air, seal it up and stick it in the fridge. An hour minimum will do the trick. I left it in there, turning it once, for about 8 hours.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Heat a large cast iron skillet and, when hot, add 2 tablespoons of the olive oil. When the oil is hot, sear the tenderloin until golden brown on all sides, about 2 minutes per side. Remove from stove top. Take the maple bacon slices and lay over the top of the tenderloins. Add a little chopped rosemary and cilantro over the top. Carefully tent with aluminum foil. Transfer to the oven and continue to cook until it reaches an internal temperature of 145 degrees F, 10 to 12 minutes longer. Pull it out of the oven & set aside to rest for about 5 minutes before slicing to serve.

Reserve 2 tablespoons of fat/juices for the accompanying sauce. Drain the fat off before placing on cutting board to rest.

Crisp up the bacon in the oven on broil for 2 minutes.

Slice thinly. Chop up the bacon and sprinkle it with the juice of the remaining lime over the top of the roasts.

Spoon a little of the sauce over the top of the pork and the asparagus.