These might be the easiest pork chops I’ve ever made. …and the most tender. …and maybe they might be tied with the Glazed Pork Chops for best tasting.
This orange molasses marinade was a total experiment and it turned out pretty good. I can tell that it’s a recipe that I’m going to keep tweaking and taking in new directions. This might not be my final version, but it is one helluva start and I wanted to share it with you anyway. The flavor isn’t super “orangey”, but I think the orange juice concentrate added an important layer of flavor, sweetness, and acidity. I had some oranges in my fridge, so I sliced one up as a garnish, but they aren’t required for the recipes. It does make a nice presentation, though, if you’re trying to impress!
I cooked these chops on my stove top, but they’d also be great for the grill. Now that the weather is warming up and weekend cooking is moving outdoors, I’d highly recommend giving these sweet yet savory pork chops a shot!
Orange Molasses Pork Chops
Orange Molasses Pork Chops
Servings 6Ingredients
- 2 lbs 6 chops thick-cut pork chops ($6.19)
- 1/4 cup molasses ($0.60)
- 1/4 cup orange juice concentrate ($0.33)
- 1 Tbsp apple cider vinegar ($0.06)
- 1 Tbsp dijon mustard ($0.11)
- 1/4 tsp garlic powder ($0.02)
- 1/2 tsp salt ($0.02)
- 2 Tbsp vegetable oil ($0.08)
Instructions
- Make the marinade by stirring together the molasses, orange juice concentrate, apple cider vinegar, dijon mustard, garlic powder, and salt. Place the marinade in a bag, add the chops, and seal tightly. Place in the refrigerator for at least two hours or longer if desired.
- When you’re ready to cook the chops, heat 2 Tbsp of vegetable oil in a large, heavy skillet over medium-high heat. When the oil is very hot (it will look wavy in the pan), add the chops. Cook for about 7 minutes on each side or until cooked through and the marinade has reduced to a thick sauce. No need to pour all of the marinade into the skillet, the amount that comes off of the chops as they cook will be plenty to make a nice sauce. Discard the extra marinade from the bag. Serve hot!
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Nutrition
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Step By Step Photos
First stir together the ingredients for the marinade: molasses, orange juice concentrate, apple cider vinegar, dijon mustard, garlic powder, and salt.
My grocery store was out of thick cut pork chops, so I bought this center cut loin roast and cut it into chops myself.
I cut the roast into 6 slices (plus one end piece), each about 1.25 inches thick.
Place the pork chops and marinade into a bag and seal it up tightly. Let it marinate for a few hours in the refrigerator.
When you’re ready to cook the pork chops, heat a couple tablespoons of vegetable oil in a large, heavy skillet until very hot (medium-high heat). When the oil is good and hot (but not smoking), add the chops. I didn’t pour the extra marinade from the bag into the skillet, there was plenty that came off of the chops as they cooked.
Cook the pork chops for about 7 minutes on each side or until they are fully cooked through and the marinade reduces to a thick sauce.
I don’t know if you can see, but the sauce is beginning to thicken… You can flip the chops a few times during cooking, just as long as they cook through. It shouldn’t take long over such high heat.
And then finally, after about 15 minutes, the sauce is nice and thick. I had to turn the heat off to make it stop bubbling so that it was visible.
If you want, you can garnish with some orange slices. These chops are super tender and juicy!
Jen – I ate these with some lemon butter green beans and maybe some rice :)
What sides do you suggest for this?
I made this today and it is now one of my favorite receipes! So easy and sooooooo delicious!!! I wanted to eat every last pork chop!
Re: marinading times
I know this is a little late, but I made these last night (DELICIOUS) after having marinading them overnight. It didn’t seem to have compromised the quality of the pork chops at all.
I agree. They weren’t as “orangey” as I expected, but I still liked them :) I think zest would definitely do the trick!
Just finished cooking these guys up. Very tasty and very subtle. The chops are very tender and moist as well and this is, overall, a great, tasty and elegant recipe. I felt it wasn’t as orangey as I had hoped, but it could possibly be the fact that I marinated them for slightly under two hours. Perhaps a little more juice concentrate or orange zest will get the job done!
Anon – regular orange juice is not nearly as concentrated in its flavor or sweetness, so it will not have the same effect in the marinade. If you wanted to squeeze the juice from an orange and then also add some of the zest for extra oomph, that might work. If you wanted to make a sauce out of this, you’d need to cook it down so that it thickens. When you first mix it up, it is quite liquidy.
Also what if I just wanted to make this as a sauce to pour on veggies or like baked beans or something..and i just put it in a jar in the fridge for the 2 hours, would that work nicely??
first, can i use real orange juice (not concentrate). 2, if I use tofu should i change anything
I made something very similar to this the other day but I use apricot-pineapple preserves as the base for my marinade (+other ingredients of course.. rice vinegar, soy, red pepper flakes, brown sugar etc), and brushed on more as it was grilling… I’m not a huge pork chop fan but these were addictive!
Yum! I recently finished off a bottle of commercial marinade that seems a lot like this recipe. It also included chipotle — might want to try that as you’re tweaking.
Excellent recipe. I have a similar version that I make using orange marmalade, brown sugar and chicken broth on the grill along with the chops. (Recipe is posted on cheap-bastid-cooks.com).
Cutting your own chops off a loin roast is the way to go. I generally buy a whole loin at Costco, cut the sirloin end off for a 2 1/2-3 lb roast and then make chops out of the rest about 1 1/2 inches thick. I use the other end (about 3/4 lb) as “leavings” for stir frying.
Recently, Fresh and Easy had pork loin roasts for $1.99/lb which nowadays is an incredible deal.
Thanks again. I like your stuff.
Walt (aka Cheap Bastid)
Hrm… How’s this work for extended maranade times? I’d love to start the meat maranading on an 18 hour overnight timeframe, but the acid/salt combo [1] seems to suggest that this might not be such a good idea
[1] http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20060731102254AAsr5r5#NbUvWDK4VzhJ8wKUWvgI
Oh boy. Orange and molasses, I never would have thought up that combo. I will let you know when I try these!!
These look delish! Just bought a bunch of navel oranges, we’ll probably try this out later this week. We made BBQ beef in the slow-cooker today. http://freshfortwo.wordpress.com/2012/04/29/in-the-mood-for-sloppy-bbq-recipe/