This recipe comes from my cousin Emily over at Favorite Family Recipes. Emily and her husband Beau lived down the street from us in Northern California and we shared many a meal and card game when our grocery budgets were in the young professional stage. We discovered some of our better recipes learning from them and trying to impress them. There was a time that we housed Beau in our basement and referred to him as our troll under the house while he was finishing his medical rotations. I felt this pressure to cook well knowing the food he ate at home with Emily.
Emily is the best hostess when our travels take us through Boise, always preparing a savory breakfast to get us on our way. She and Beau know all the best restaurants and make sure to get babysitters so we can enjoy them too. Emily and her equally talented sister, Erica, started a food blog a few years ago and they have been the inspiration to get ourselves in gear and join in the food blogging world. In order to show our appreciation, I wanted to showcase one of their recipes. I picked out a few dinner ideas and this was my favorite one because it is made with simple ingredients and has powerful, delicious flavor.
My kids, ages two to ten, devoured these. The husband ate so much we didn’t have leftovers. The little people liked the pork enough that when they were only allowed to eat more meat if they ate another bite of vegetables, they actually ate the vegetables.
My only advice is to make sure you are using a pork chop with nice marbling when making these kabobs. You don’t want the meat overly dry and that can happen with pork that is too lean.
4 to 6 pounds pork chops, I like using the top sirloin pork chop that has a bit more marbling
Marinade Ingredients:
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup soy sauce (if cooking gluten free make sure you use a gluten free soy sauce like San-J Tamari Soy Sauce)
3 tablespoons hoisin sauce
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
2 teaspoons minced garlic
- 4-6 pounds pork chops
- ¾ cup sugar
- ½ cup soy sauce
- 3 tablespoons Hoisin sauce
- 1 tablespoon rice vinegar
- 1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
- 2 teaspoons minced garlic
- Trim the fat off of the chops and then cut into bite size pieces. In a medium size bowl combine the marinade ingredients. Put the pieces of pork in a zip-lock bag and then add the marinade. Squish the bag around to distribute the marinade and then place in the fridge for at least one hour.
- Thread the pork pieces on skewers and reserve the extra marinade. Let the pork come to room temperature by keeping the pork out for about twenty minutes.
- Pour the excess marinade into a small pot and cook the marinade over medium heat. Let it come to a boil and then boil for one minute. (I even boil it longer because raw pork makes me irrationally nervous.)
- Grill the kabobs over medium heat, basting with the excess marinade until the outside is dark brown and the inside is fully cooked. All juices should run clear. I like to reserve a bit of the marinade to serve with the meat on the side. Kids seem to like it dumped over their rice.
- This is perfect with grilled pineapple or vegetable skewers.
