Posted By Greg on September 24, 2009

You’re watching one of the many cooking competition reality shows on TV and the camera passes a contestant with a lovely, caramelized piece of meat, spooning butter over the top and you wonder “why doesn’t my meat look like that when I sauté it?” The answer is – because they aren’t sautéing – they are pan roasting.

Pan roasting is one of the essential tools in a cook’s bag of tricks but doesn’t get much time dedicated in cookbooks, so most who have never tried it have no idea of what it entails. Where oven roasting relies on ambient heat from the oven, pan roasting utilizes direct heat from the pan that it is cooking in.

Pan roasting does not equal pan-frying or sautéing.  Pan-frying is exactly what it sounds like – frying in a pan, with a large amount of oil. Think about your grandmother frying chicken in an old cast iron pan and you’ll get the picture. Sautéing (literally, to hop) relates to high heat and short cooking times and is commonly done with vegetables or thin cuts of meat. Pan roasting, on the other hand, is accomplished with low to moderate heat and just a sheen of oil. Sauté = high and fast, pan roast = low and slow.

The basic technique of pan roasting is to start with a thick-bottomed pan, heated well over medium-low heat, then adding your protein of choice, and slowly allowing the meat to caramelize, much like what would occur in the oven. For added moisture and flavor, whole butter is usually added in the last minutes of cooking to baste the meat. When all is said and done, there is a bonus – the fond (not the Fonz - ‘cuz the fond is even cooler)

The fond is a fancy French word for all of the lovely caramelized bits that are left in the bottom of the pan after the meat has cooked. Yeah, so? Well, when the meat is done, you can remove it from the pan and while the meat is resting, that fond can be used to make a quick pan sauce out of almost anything that you’ve got in the kitchen. A bit of water, wine, vinegar, or real stock can be added to the pan to deglaze, the brown bits scraped from the bottom, and a bit of butter, mustard, BBQ sauce, hot sauce, soy, whatever, can be stirred in and reduced slightly for bonus points to your already awesome protein.

This method works with almost any meat that you can think of, and can be used on thick pieces of seafood, as well. In 20 minutes of less (depending on the thickness of your cut of meat) you can have roasted meat and a quick sauce. Beats watching a chicken roast for an hour and a half through the window of your oven, doesn’t it?

Pan Roasted Pork Chop with Red Wine-Dijon Pan Sauce

2 thick cut pork chops
1 teaspoon canola oil
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
½ cup red wine
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
sea or kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Season the pork chops well on both sides with salt and pepper. Heat a heavy bottomed sauté pan or cast iron skillet over medium-low heat (number four on an electric stove). When heated, add the canola oil and swirl it around to evenly coat the pan and add the pork chops. There should be an audible sizzle from the chops, if there is not, or if the sizzle is faint, get them out of the pan and let it heat until they do sizzle.

Sizzle accomplished, do NOTHING to the chops for the next four minutes. It’s tempting to play with them, but don’t. Really. Just don’t. Turn the chops over and add the butter to the pan. When the butter is melted, baste the chops with the butter frequently for another four minutes. Remove the chops from the pan and let them rest for five minutes.

While the chops are resting, discard the extra grease from the pan and return it to the heat. Add the red wine and scrape the fond from the bottom of the pan, then quickly stir in the Dijon. Season with salt and pepper and top the chops with the pan sauce.

Categories: Beef, Breakfast and Brunch, Budget Recipes, French Cuisine, Main Course, Pork, Super Fast Recipes, cool shit
Tags: chef techniques, cooking with red wine, dijon, meat sauce, pan roasting, quick cooking