Placating with Plating: Pork, Rice, Squash

You eat with your eyes first. But adult eyes and child eyes often see things a little differently. Who cares? Does it really make that much difference if the priority is an appealing balance of colors or enough "white space" on the plate or just making sure the food is not touching more than necessary?

Tonight's dinner: Jasmine rice with peas/carrots, free-range pork chops and a medley of roasted yellow squash, pattypan squash, garlic chunks and kohlrabi. A little freshly-baked wheat bread rounds out the meal. For some reason, many children, including mine, seem to prefer their food as segregated as possible. Should we call it "deconstructed" instead? It's not terribly hard to manage generally, so I try to honor that preference without being ruled by it, as evidenced by my rather brazen addition of peas/carrots to the rice.

The biggest differences between kid/adult plates are onions and veggie portioning. I topped my rice with sauteed onions and orange-pineapple jus from the pork pan. The kids got one piece each of yellow squash, pattypan squash and kohlrabi, while my plate is piled high with all those plus some garlic chunks. The bright green, orange and yellow of the veggies are offset brilliantly by the white rice and white plates, so this was a colorful and appealing early summer meal.

Not counting the bread, this could easily be a 40-minute dinner. The bread baking takes about an hour (counting time necessary to preheat the oven), so technically it's an hour prep. Swapping fresh bread for heat-and-serve rolls or skipping bread altogether makes pork chops one of my favorite "go to" meals after a hectic day on the go. I'll include a rundown after the break.

Dinner doesn't need to be fancy. Heck, it doesn't even need to be homemade. Really, it doesn't even have to be dinner -- it could be breakfast. It just needs to be time together to share and nourish body and soul.

For the record, the children ate rice, peas, carrots, bread/butter and pork. It was not surprising that they didn't touch the squash, but they did ask what each one was called and (amazingly) no one disparaged this vegetable that still holds a strong "yuck factor" for them both.

Cooking rundown:

Preheat oven, set out bread dough. Season pork on both sides with kosher salt and freshly cracked pepper and let sit to come to room temperature. Shell peas, chop carrots. Put on water for rice. Slice squash/kohlrabi into large chunks and toss with olive oil, salt and pepper. Put bread and veggies in oven. Put empty skillet on med-high heat. Add rice/carrots to pot when water boils. Trim fat from pork chops and chop fat to render in hot skillet. (This is a good time for a glass of wine if you actually have some in the house.) 

Chop an onion (or pepper or bok choy or whatever you have that is fresh). Keep an eye on your skillet and stir so you get crispy bits instead of burned bits. If anything burns, discard it and go with canola or olive oil. But assuming all is well, pour off extra fat from skillet ("extra" being very subjective). Brown pork chops for a minute or so on each side and remove from skillet. Add onion and let it sauté on med-high heat. Add peas to rice. Turn veggies in oven. Add some chopped garlic to skillet and continue to cook until fragrant.

Deglaze skillet (I used orange-pineapple juice...about 1/4 cup since I didn't have any stock defrosted and no wine). Once liquid reduces slightly, reduce heat to LOW, add chops back in and spoon the jus/onions over them. Cover pan and let the chops continue to cook on very low heat until the bread/rice/veggies are done. If something delays dining, turn off the heat completely on the pork after 10 minutes. Don't let them dry out!

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