Idaho® Garlic Mashed Potato Puffs with Whiskey Black Pepper Pork Loin Slow Cooked and Brown Butter & Whiskey Apples
Ingredients:
Perfect Pork Roast
- 3 to 3½ lb center cut boneless pork loin roast, with thin layer of fat on one side (Note: if you can’t find a roast with thin layer of fat on top, you will top with three strips of raw bacon when ready to roast)
- 2 to 3 teaspoons freshly ground sea salt or Kosher salt
- 3 strips bacon (plus an extra three strips, if your roast doesn’t have thin layer of fat on top)
- ¼ cup whiskey
- ¼ cup chicken stock
- 1 whole head garlic (Note: You will roast this next to the roast, but use for the potato puffs)
Garlic Mashed Idaho® Potato Puffs
- 5 to 6 cups vegetable oil for deep-fat fryer (level of oil specified by your fryer model)
- 6 Idaho® potatoes, peeled, cubed, simmered and mashed to make 3 cups mashed potatoes
- 3 large eggs, beaten
- 1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
- 1 whole head of roasted garlic, minced or mashed
- ½ cup all-purpose flour
- 5 tablespoons chives, minced, divided
- salt and freshly-ground pepper
- 2 cups Idaho instant mashed potato flakes
Whiskey Apples
- 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 2 Granny Smith apples, quartered, seeded, peeled and sliced with a mandolin slicer
- ½ cup whiskey
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar
- sea salt flakes, to taste
Directions:
Perfect Pork Roast
- Rub salt into pork roast and wrap tightly with plastic wrap. Allow to rest in the refrigerator for 24 hours.
- Preheat oven to 225° F.
- Pat roast dry. Place three strips of bacon in Dutch oven or heavy roasting pan over low heat on stove top. Render the fat; remove and discard the bacon. Leave fat in roasting pan and add pork roast to pan. Brown all sides of the pork roast in the fat.
- Add whiskey and broth to the Dutch oven containing the browned roast and bacon fat. If your roast doesn’t have a thin layer of fat on top, cover the roast with three additional strips of uncooked bacon. Place Dutch oven–uncovered–in oven. Place a foil packet containing whole head of garlic and 1 Tbsp of water on the oven rack next to the roast.
- Roast for 1 and ½ hours. Turn oven off, leaving roast (and garlic) in oven for an additional 30 minutes. Remove from oven.
- Heat fat in fryer to 375° F.
- In a large bowl, mix together mashed potatoes, eggs, cheese, garlic, flour, 3 tablespoons of the chives and salt and pepper. If the dough is still too wet, add a tablespoon or two more flour so that you can shape the mixture into soft balls that hold shape.
- In a separate bowl, mix together remaining 2 tablespoons of the chives and dry mashed potato flakes.
- Shape mashed potato “dough” into small balls; roll each in mashed potato flakes.
- Gently place five to six of the balls in the fryer basket, lower into fat and fry until golden crisp; about 3 to 5 minutes.
- Remove to a paper-towel-lined platter. Repeat until all of the mashed potato “dough” has been used up.
Whiskey Apples
- In a heavy skillet over medium heat, melt butter. Stir until butter begins to turn brown and release a nutty aroma.
- Add sliced apples. Increase heat to high. Stir until apples are tender.
- Add brown sugar and continue stirring/sautéing until sugar has liquefied.
- Add whiskey; sauté for a few more minutes until apples are soft and sauce, silky.
To plate: Slice roast and fan on one side of plate. Serve with five or six potato puffs and portion of whiskey apples on the side.