Chopped Challenge #8: Pulled Pork Sliders with Macaroni and Cheese

Even though I wasn't writing any blog posts during the holidays, Justin and I were still trucking along with our Chopped challenges. Over the next week or two, I'll try to catch up on the posts for the ones we did during that time. We'll start with my challenge to Justin to use Hawaiian sweet bread (one of my favorite foods), steak sauce, mushrooms, and condensed cheese soup.

Chopped Challenge #5, Part 1: Coffee-Crusted Pork Loin

This time around, my ingredients for the Chopped challenge were pork, bourbon, Texas toast, and coffee. Something about those ingredients just clicked for me, and it took me all of 5 seconds to decide what I'd be making. I was actually really excited about this challenge, too, for whatever reason, so I definitely was looking forward to making it. I have to say, I was not disappointed. So far we've been pretty lucky and haven't made anything really terrible, or even halfway terrible for that matter. I know we're only 5 challenges in, but that's still pretty good.

For this challenge, I decided to make a coffee-crusted pork loin, maple bourbon barbecue sauce, and a savory, white cheddar bread pudding. (I'll discuss the barbecue sauce and bread pudding in separate posts and just stick to the pork loin in this one.) I've never actually made or even had coffee-crusted anything before. I know that it's a thing that a lot of restaurants do it, so I figured it can't be bad, right? I'm glad I gave it a try because it's really easy to do and tastes great. I liked the pork with the crust by itself, but Justin thought it was much better when paired with the barbecue sauce because the coffee crust is a little bitter and the sauce was nice and sweet. I agree that they complimented each other nicely, but I was just fine eating the pork alone as well. It made for a nice change to plain ol' roasted pork.

Carnitas

Justin and I both love burritos. When his boss asked where he wanted to go for lunch for his birthday, he picked a burrito bar a few miles from the university. Qdoba might be my biggest fast food weakness, especially their breakfast burritos. Ask them to grill it a little bit after they've wrapped it up in foil, and it makes it even better. The outside gets a tad crispy like a quesadilla, and the cheese starts to melt. Mmmm... It'll change your life.

The beauty of burritos is that you can pack pretty much whatever you want in to them. Don't like beans? Leave them out. Want more cheese? Add it in. As long as it's in a tortilla, it's still technically a burrito, and the burrito police won't stop you. In my opinion, putting just about anything in a tortilla makes it infinitely better. That being said, pork is probably my favorite burrito filling. (Justin, on the other hand, would argue for chorizo.)