Beer-Brined Pork Chops with Beer-Mustard Sauce

We had a wonderful dinner last night, and it is all thanks to Women's Health Magazine and their recipe for Beer-Brined Pork Chops.

Here's how it's done...

Ingredients:

Three bottles of Pilsner
3 tbsp Kosher Salt
1 tbsp Sugar
4 bone-in Pork Chops, 1 1/2 inches thick
1 tbsp plus 2 tsp Vegetable Oil
2 diced Shallots
1 cup Chicken Broth
1 tbsp Honey
2 tbsp Balsamic Vinegar
1/2 tsp Dried Thyme
1 tbsp Grainy Mustard
2 tsp Cornstarch
1/2 tsp Black Pepper

First marinate the pork chops in 2 bottles Pilsner, 2 cups water, kosher salt, and sugar. Refrigerate for 4-6 hours, we had ours in there for closer to 7-8.

About half an hour before you want to eat, make the sauce. I have to say, the sauce was OK, but certainly not great. I'm not going to copy the recipe into here because, well, I probably won't make it again. It can be found in the link above if you are interested.


Time to cook the chops! Since we've been together, almost 5 years, we've never made pork chops, but we did our best! First we had to remove them from the marinade and pat them dry with paper towels. Season with pepper and heat up some oil, and then it's cooking time! The recipe calls for 4-5 minutes per side, but we had to double that for the chops to cook through. We'll probably buy thinner ones next time.


Boy, were they yummy. They were moist and tasty, the marinade was fantastic. We sauteed some spinach to round everything off. Oh, we also drank the remaining beer : )