Impressing Your In-Laws

I love making dinner for other people and this is one of those simple dishes that tastes really awesome and seems more complicated than it really is. It's the kind of dish you make when trying to impress your mother-in-law. Or, guys, this one is good to make for a date.

Most recently, I made this for my friends, Matt and Andra, and their tween daughters. For our meal we served it with broiled kale and sweet potato biscuits (pictured here), but the recipe below serves it with greens two ways.

Pork Tenderloin & Two-Way Greens

--olive oil
--garlic
--6 slices of prosciutto (available at the deli counter)
--salt & pepper
--1 lb. pork tenderloin
--balsamic vinegar
--bag or bunch of spinach
--bag or bunch of arugula
--bag or box of grape, plum, or cherry tomatoes (I like to mix n' match)

Prep:

Wash the greens. Cut off stems and dry.
Trim excess fat off of pork loin. Slice into 1/2" thick rounds
Roughly chop prosciutto into fingernail sized chunks. You can also rip it with your hands instead.
If tomatoes are large, chop them in half. If they are smaller this is unnecessary.

Heat oil on medium high heat. Cook garlic and prosciutto until brown. Set aside.

Salt and pepper the pork rounds. Sear pork rounds, cooking 5-7 minutes on each side (depending on size and thickness of the rounds). Set aside.

Deglaze the pan with balsamic vinegar. Newbies, what this means is dump some vinegar into that hot pan and scrape all the bits up. The vinegar will evaporate some and what's left will make a thin sticky sauce.

Add half of the arugula and half of the spinach in fist fulls and toss with tongs. Add more greens as mixture cooks down. Add 3/4 of the tomatoes into the greens mixture, tossing and heating until tomatoes are warm and squish in your mouth. Add 3/4 of the cooked prosciutto/garlic mix and toss until evenly mixed. Spoon this over the pork pieces.

Use the remaining uncooked greens, tomatoes, and prosciutto to make a salad. Top with balsamic vinegar as a dressing.