Pork Piccata and Napa Cabbage Slaw

Friday November 9

When giant boneless pork tenderloins go on sale, we buy a whole one (a long narrow thing, ca. 5-6 lbs.), cut it up into proper dinner-sized portions, and freeze most of it. Slightly stringy lengths are cut into thin pieces for Chinese barbecue (char siu); nice round bits are sliced either into half-inch-thick medallions or paper-thin scallopine; and there should always be at least one 2-pound length left whole, for a pork roast.

The thinnest slices are suitable for any scaloppine-type recipe that usually uses veal or chicken breast. We chose the classic piccata, which uses Barbara's favorite flavor, lemon, and is as quick as a very quick thing.

Lay out 4-6 paper-thin slices of pork, salt them a tiny bit, and pat them with the leaves from 4-6 sprigs of fresh lemon thyme.

In butter and oil, brown the pork scaloppine on each side, about 4-5 minutes total. Set aside in a warming oven.

Deglaze the pan with 2-3 Tbsps. lemon juice. Stir to thicken it over high heat, and throw in a Tbsp. or so of capers.

Get the pork out, and pour any juices off it into the pan, where they can thicken a bit more. If the pork needs rewarming, you can toss the slices in the pan, but if it's still toasty, just lay them out on plates, pour the hot sauce over, and serve.

Here's the directions for the tasty blue-cheese slaw we had alongside, originally Nice Kathy's recipe.

This is the recipe we think of first whenever we get a napa cabbage.