Quick Seared Pork Chops

Does weekend grilling interfere with weekend football? Yeah, me too, though I tend to look at as football interferes with my weekend grilling! Well, the football season is upon us and I ran headfirst into this dilemma on the very first football Sunday. Not because I hadn’t planned my grilling accordingly so I would miss as little of the games as possible. No, I was reverse searing a pork tenderloin which doesn’t take a lot of time and I didn’t need to stand over it. My problem arose midway through the fourth quarter of the afternoon games (when my smoked tenderloin was ready to sear). That’s when I found out we would have additional guests for dinner. The side dishes were close to being done. I had less than 20 minutes to get something amazing together lest my guests snicker on the way home to each other, “I thought this guy was some big time grill guy. I could grill better than that.” Luckily the good folks at Smithfield helped me tackle this issue with their marinated fresh pork products.

This is not a recipe. This is a lesson in adapting and overcoming. Sometimes all you need is a quick sear. If you want to give our best pork chop recipe a go, check this link. 

I had one of these Applewood Smoked Bacon Pork Loin Filets from Smithfield in the fridge which saved my proverbial hind end:

I didn’t have time to infuse the pork loin with smoke, but I did have time to give them a wicked good sear and hope the apple wood smoked bacon it was marinated and infused with took care of the rest.

Here’s what the pork loin looked like outside of the packaging:

Did I mention it has bacon?! Sort of a pork on pork thing that is very appealing to a backyard griller. I’d really like to smoke this as roast but the game clock is ticking, so I cut down the mass of the pork loin (and grilling time) by slicing into chops:

I decided to cut it into thick (approx. 1 ½ inch) slices and grill the marinated pork over direct heat:

You read that right. Slice and then give them a quick sear. It doesn’t even need salt as the bacon provides enough that I didn’t need to add any extra.

This process took maybe 10 minutes tops thanks to the fact that the pork loin was packaged with the apple wood smoked bacon and I parted the roast out into chops before they were quick seared. Grilling them hot and fast got them done in time and kissed them with those glorious crosshatch grill marks that also add a ton of flavor, not to mention make them so purdy! And the best part, no delay of game penalties!

Full Disclosure ~ Smithfield provided the GrillinFools product and compensation to do this post. But as you know, we wouldn’t put anything on this site that isn’t really good and quick seared pork chops were outstanding inside and out. Save yourself some time without sacrificing flavor the next time you’re craving some big chops and pick up one of these pork loins. 

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Greg Thomas

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This article was initially published on: September 23, 2015