Poor Richard's Tavern Spruce Pork Chops

This recipe combines some of my favorite things: Ben Franklin, Philadelphia, and pork. Yards, a local brewery, brews a beer from Ben Franklin's recipe called Poor Richard's Tavern Spruce. It's part of their Ales of the Revolution series, which are all delicious. I'd drink Tavern Spruce no matter what, since it's Ben's beer, but I also happen to love it. I had some pork chops I needed to use and wanted something other than a boring baked pork chop. A friend suggested marinating them in hard cider and brown sugar and making a glaze with the liquid. Sounds good, right? Well, I didn't have cider when I got home, but I did have Tavern Spruce. It made for some great pork chops.

You'll need:

2-4 boneless pork chops

1 bottle Yard's Poor Richard's Tavern 

2 cloves garlic, grated or finely minced

salt and pepper

Olive oil

Brown sugar, if desired.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a gallon sized zipper bag, grate garlic on a zester. Poor beer over zester into bag to rise off remaining garlic. Alternatively, place minced garlic in bag and add beer. 

Place pork chops in bag. Remove as much air as possible from the bag and seal. Refrigerate for at least 3 hours up to overnight. I like to put the bag in the meat drawer when I do this. That way, if you get a leak, it's contained in the drawer and you can hold the top of the bag out of the drawer as you slide it shut to keep the bag upright.

Remove bag from refrigerator. Remove pork chops from bag and pat dry with a paper towel. Pour liquid into a small sauce pan, making sure to get as much garlic from the bag as possible. Add salt and pepper to taste, or add 1 Tb brown sugar if you'd rather have a sweeter sauce. Heat over medium heat until boiling, then reduce heat and allow to simmer. Keep an eye on this!! 

Boiling beer gets very foamy and you're going to need to stir it down. You can chose to skim off the foam with a slotted spoon if you'd like. Liquid will thicken as it reduces, but will still be relatively thin. Thicken with corn starch, whisked in a teaspoon at a time, until it reaches your desired thickness.

Season both sides of pork chops with salt and pepper. In an oven-safe skillet or dutch oven, heat one tablespoon olive oil over medium high heat. When bubbles begin to form in the oil, add pork chops. Allow pork chops to brown, 3-4 minutes, then flip. Allow to brown on the other side, then place pan in oven. Cook pork chops for 20-30 minutes.

Plate pork chops and drizzle with sauce. Serve along side rice or pasta, that you can also drizzle with beer sauce. Enjoy!

I loved these and the bf even liked them. He was quite skeptical at first but enjoyed the final product. Our house smelled awesome as this all cooked.