Sweet and Sour Pork

Sweet and Sour Pork

Here is a great recipe for January, it's quite low in fat and its a hot enough sweet and sour to warm you up in the dark cold evenings. Pork fillet is lean and to make it even more so, trim away any excess fat on the outside of it although there shouldn't be much at all.

I love cooking these kinda meals in the dark evenings, Ciara normally only gets home from work about 8.10 so I start head into the kitchen (if I'm not in it already) about 7.30 to get dinner on. I normally don't like eating dinner that late unless we are out for a meal but that's life for you, it's an excuse not to load up on portion sizes and that way Ciara get's to take the left overs for her lunch to work the next day.

I serve this with fried brown rice, but you can serve it with boiled rice, egg noodles etc. also, feel free to load more veg into it to fill up on the good stuff, mushrooms, broccoli, cauliflower, courgette, squash etc.

Calories 686

343 per portion

(Add 218 pp for brown rice)

Serves 2:

200g pork fillet

Sea salt and black pepper

1 onion

 1 red pepper

1 yellow pepper

1 fat clove of garlic

Half a small red chilli

A thumb sized piece of ginger

Rapeseed oil

1 teaspoon of Chinese five-spice

1 tablespoon of corn flour

3 tablespoons of dark soy sauce

A small tin of pineapple chunks

2 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar

Coriander leaves to garnish

Method

Cut the pork fillet length-ways down the middle then cut each side into cubes and season with the salt and pepper. Peel, halve and chop the onion into chunks. De-seed the peppers and chop into bite size pieces. Finely slice the garlic, chilli and ginger.

Heat a large frying pan or wok on a high heat, when hot add the rapeseed oil along with the pork pieces, immediately sprinkle over the Chinese five-spice and brown off the pork for a few minutes. Remove into a clean bowl using a slotted spoon.

Give the pan/wok a wipe down then return to the heat, add more oil then add all the chopped vegetables. Cook this all for about 2 mins stirring frequently. Stir in the corn flour and add the soy sauce, cook for a further minute then add back in the pork along with the pineapple chunks, their juice and the balsamic vinegar.

Check the seasoning and cook for a further few mins ensuring the pork is cooked through (break a piece open to check). Simmer for a few mins until sauce thickens if needed.

Serve with fried rice and a garnish of coriander leaves.