Pork Posole

I have three things I like to cook these days:

1. Things to keep my family alive (the basics) 

2. Things that make me happy (already tested) 

3. Things that don't take a lot of time or money (no big investment) 

Today this Pork Posole soup was in category number three. I felt like cooking, but Christmas is just days away. Which means family is visiting, laundry needs to be done, and gifts need to be wrapped. And oh yeah, there's that new job I just started three months ago. So I need low investment, high returns.

I turned to my favorite go to magazine, Cooking Light. (I really look through my other cookbooks, but what the f@&% is cream of tartar?) 

Here's the Pork Posole recipe I found today. Totally easy, and delicious! Took about 40 minutes of prep time (between opening beers) and then it simmered for another hour. 

Only two things went awry. First, the pork did not give off a lot of fat. I think that's because I like to over trim my meat. So when I added the onions, there were no "drippings" left. I added a tiny bit of olive oil to make up for it. Because of the lack of fat drippings, the bottom of the pan browned quickly. So I stirred the onions a little more than usual so they wouldn't stick and burn. As for the browning, it was all good once the beer hit the pan and the pan deglazed. 

Second, I didn't have cayenne pepper (crushed red pepper), so I just used some chili powder instead. Worse things could happen. 

Again soup was good. Really good. Better yet, the kids liked it. And, better still, it was cheap. So while it started in category three, it's probably going to jump to category two. Once I figure out how to make it in the microwave it will join category number one.