Root Beer Pork Chops

This blog is dedicated to Ken from CA...this is his Root Beer Pork Chop recipe! As a lot of you know, I don't like pork in any form excepting sausage, ham and bacon. It's been 40+ years and I have despaired from ever finding a pork chop recipe that I actually LIKED! Bob, my husband, however, loves pork in any form, so he had bought a whole, pre-cut pork loin and stuck in our friends' freezer. I wanted to stay relatively inexpensive on the food budget this week, so I bit the bullet and asked him to bring home a package of pork. He was ecstatic! First, I made the root beer reduction, you can do this hours ahead of time, if you're so inclined. I made two small changes. I didn't have beef broth, I thought I did, but, no...so I used vegetable stock instead...and I also added roughly a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar. You bring the sauce to a boil, lower the heat and just let it hang out and reduce and get full of flavor. The night before, I marinaded 4 thick chops in 2 cans of root beer...that's it...put it in a ziploc freezer bag, stick it in the fridge and FORGETABOUTIT! The longer these marinate in the root beer, the better they are! I found great looking California strawberries at the store and bought them for strawberry shortcake. I added four ingredients to sliced strawberries...

2 tablespoons of white tequila, 1 tablespoon of triple sec, a dash of vanilla and about 1/2 cup of sugar for one pound of strawberries...let it all hang out for at least a couple of hours to marinade...Strawberry Margarita Shortcake...yummmm....

Then I gathered all the necessary tools and headed out to the grill....

The reduction sauce should be rather thick, like this. If it's not, pop it back on low heat for a while and let it simmer away until it is....

I grilled the salt and peppered chops over hot coals, at first, to sear them....then lowered the coals after I flipped them...it took about 10 minutes total...

Then I started basting those suckers with the reduction sauce, first one side...

Then the other...

and OMG! these are FANTASTIC!

I served with just a simple romaine salad and honey-french dressing...

Another look at those fantastic chops....

Ken, this is an amazing recipe that I will forever-more make over and over...you have done the impossible and created a pork recipe that I like...THANK YOU!