Today is 6 days before Halloween. I figured that now was a good of a time as any to work on carving our pumpkins. Oh, I had to go get the pumpkins too! LOL! I had wanted to take Jon & Hannah to the small pumpkin patch up the street, but it was rainy & wet this morning, of course. Wal-Mart and their pumpkins would have to do. Hey, they were under $4 a piece and they were a pretty good size! We headed out to mother-in-law’s house for the carving festivities. Jon informed me on the way over that he wasn’t really all that interested in carving a pumpkin. He didn’t want to get his hands dirty. Oh, that and his hand/wrist was sore and still healing from his recent injury. Okay, fine. I told him that he could take pictures and I would help Hannah. Once Hannah found out how messy (the insides) it was and how hard they pumpkins were to carve (very tough for some reason), she was all about swinging outside on the swing and abandoning the whole project. Glad we made plans to carve pumpkins today, huh? Well, the kids disinterest didn’t discourage MIL, FIL and I from carving up the 2 pumpkins that we had. The first one was much easier to carve than the 2nd one. The second one was very tough and hard to get a knife through. Thank goodness for FIL being there as I don’t think that MIL or I were strong enough to finish them up.
A couple quick pictures:
In honor of the pumpkin carving, MIL is going to roast the seeds and bring them by tomorrow morning. I can’t wait to snack on those! A great gluten-free snack! I also centered tonight’s dinner around pumpkins by making a Creamy Pumpkin Brown Rice recipe that is from Whole Food’s website. I did make some changes. Here is the recipe I used:
1 cup brown basmati rice
1.5 TBSP EVOO
Saute rice & EVOO until rice is toasted, about 3-5 minutes
Combine 3 cups chicken broth and 7 -8 oz. canned pumpkin puree in a bowl and whisk together
Add 1 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp nutmeg, salt & pepper to the chicken & pumpkin
Pour mixture into rice and bring to a boil. Stir and turn down to simmer for 40 – 45 minutes. Remove from heat and let sit for 5 minutes. Add more salt/pepper, if needed. **I left out the onion (can’t eat them) and bay leaves (didn’t have any) and added the cinnamon & nutmeg.
Now, for the yummy part. I had an acorn squash laying around so I decided to cook it up in the micro (sliced, removed seeds and seasoned with cinnamon & brown sugar; place face up in micro safe dish, added 1/2 cup of water to dish & covered with saran wrap; micro for 10 min or until tender). Once the squash was done, I filled my half with the rice and topped with chopped walnuts! YUM!!! I served that along with Perfect Pork Tenderloin (recipe to follow) and a mixed greens salad. Dessert was pumpkin ice cream topped with chocolate chips. Perfect end to a perfect pumpkin filled day!
Perfect Pork Tenderloin
Ingredients
· bonelesspork tenderloins or pork loin roast (my pork loin was 2 lbs 12 oz and I cooked it for 16 minutes and let sit in the oven for an hour after that)
· salt and pepper
· dryseasoning, of your choice( I used thyme, rosemary, garlic powder, basil, oregano, S & P)
Directions
1. NOTE: The success of this cooking method will depend upon how accurate the temperature of your oven is and how well your oven retains heat. Adjust cooking time +/- according your individual oven.
2. Get the EXACT weight of roast from the meat wrapper.
3. Weight will determine how long to cook the roast.
4. Preheat oven to 550 degrees.
5. Remove roast from refrigerator. Season roast as desired. Place seasoned roast in an uncovered roasting pan.
6. Bake EXACTLY 5 1/2 minutes PER POUND. Adjust +/- according to your oven’s accuracy and heat retention.
7. Turn oven OFF and DO NOT open oven door for 1 hour.
8. Remove from oven and let rest 5 minutes to redistribute internal juices.
9. Roast will be done, very slightly pink in the center, and very moist.
10. NOTE:******* For anyone questioning this method of cooking, it really does reach the proper internal temperature on a thermometer.
11. If you have a thermometer that has a wire that goes through the side of the oven door, by all means use it and set alarm for 140-145 degrees.
12. It should go off before the hour is up.
13. After resting 5-10 minutes, the roast should reach 145-150 degrees.
14. According to Sara Moulton on FoodTV, salmonella is killed at 138 degrees, and 145 is a safe temperature for pork, although the USDA recommends 160 degrees (meat will be drier).
This is one of our favorite pork tenderloin/pork loin recipes. 🙂
