Chuletas de Puerco Criollas (Cuban Pork Chops)

8 thin center-cut pork chops, about 4 oz. each
fresh-ground black pepper
4 cloves garlic
1/4 teaspoon ea. oregano and cumin
1/2 cup sour (Seville) orange juice OR
1/4 cup sweet orange juice mixed with 1/8 cup ea. lime and lemon juice
2 large onions, thinly sliced
1/4 pure olive oil

1) Season the chops with pepper. In a mortar, crush the garlic, oregano, and cumin together into a paste. Rub the chops with the garlic paste, place in a non-reactive bowl, pour the orange juice over, and cover with the sliced onions. Cover and refrigerate for 2 to 3 hours. 2) Remove the chops from the marinade, pat dry with paper towels, and reserve the marinade. In a large skillet, heat the oil over medium heat until fragrant, then brown the chops on both sides. Add reserved marinade, including the onions,cover, and cook until the chops are tender, about 20 minutes. Taken from Memories of a Cuban Kitchen by Mary Urrutia Randelman and Joan Schwartz.

A few things about this recipe:
- Cooking with the marinade that the raw meat was in is okay since you'll be cooking it for 20 minutes.
- We browned the chops in the skillet and baked them with the marinade in a baking dish in the oven at 350F instead.
- Cooking the chops for 20 minutes seemed like a long time to us (we usually pan-fry them for 4 minutes on a side). They actually came out very tender, however.

From: dwprosser at umass.edu