Pork & Apples

I am somewhat of an amateur cook and like to mess around in the kitchen from time to time. I went shopping last week and they had a pretty good deal on some thin boneless pork chops, about 1/4 of an inch thick. I picked the pork chops up though I had no idea what I was going to do with them. As I completed the rest of my shopping I was putting together a recipe in my head. What I ended up with was a nice tasty dish that I think most people would enjoy. For my theme I tried to bring together the concept of having applesauce on pork chops. The following is a list of ingredients that you might have already, it's a pretty simple dish.

FOOD

1 box of Stove Top stuffing (I recommend chicken)
1 box carton of your favorite chicken stock
3-4 apples (I prefer Empire)
3-4 1/4" boneless pork chops
butter as needed

SPICES

1 Tablespoon cinnamon
1 Tablespoon granulated sugar
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon ground allspice
2 teaspoons thyme
pinch of nutmeg
Salt & Pepper

ADDITIONAL ITEMS

Meat Mallet
1 large Ziploc freezer bag

First thing you want to do is preheat your oven to 400F. Next grab your apples and throughly wash them and remove the produce stickers. Very carefully cut the apples into quarters and carve out the seed portions. Then chop up each quarter into 4 rough cubes. In a small bowl combine the cinnamon, sugar, cloves, allspice, and nutmeg together. Grab a clear casserole dish and add the apples. Take that wonderful smelling mixture of spices and dump it on the apples, then use your hands and mix up the spice and apples so they are pretty evenly coated. Add two tablespoons of butter. Put this apple mixture in the oven and cook for about 15-20 minutes until apples are soft but no overly browned.

While the apples are cooking go ahead and prepare your Stove Top stuffing per the directions except uses chicken stock instead of the water called for (more flavor). Basically you are boiling stock and butter then adding stuffing ,so you can also prepare the pork at the same time the apples and stuffing are cooking. Take you pork chops and put them in the Ziploc bag. Now get as much air out of the bag as possible then seal tightly. Grab you meat mallet and notice that it has two sides, one with points and one side totally flat. We will be using the flat side NOT the pointy side. Find a hard non-movable sure to put the Ziploc bag on. The simply beat the pork. When beating the pork remember that it is already dead so don't get overzealous. You want to increase the size roughly by double without putting any holes in the pork. If you have kids I suggest you let them take care of this part, they seem to love helping out in this way!

Use a large lasagna pan or large baking dish and place the pork in there without the Ziploc bag. Then sprinkle the thyme on and then salt & pepper to your liking. After the pork has been spiced up flip it over so the spiced side is down. Next layer the cooked stuffing on top, it should come real close to covering the pork. Then take your baked apples and pour them on top of the stuffing. Drop the temperature of the oven to 350 and place the baking dish in the oven. Cook anywhere from 30-40 minutes (make sure you use a meat thermometer - 165F is ideal for pork).

That's my recipe and I hope you enjoy it. I'm a working dad and I know you will appreciate this quick dinner idea. Just remember, a little love in the kitchen will go a long way on the table.