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Pork Tenderloin, Saute'

A sautéed pork tenderloin seasoned with salt and pepper, coated in flour, and cooked in bacon fat, finished with a brown sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pork and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 22,121 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Pork Tenderloin, Saute'

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wipe the tenderloin and split it lengthwise.

  2. Sprinkle with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

Sear and cook

  1. Heat 3 tablespoons of bacon fat in a skillet until smoking hot.

  2. Roll the tenderloin in flour and place it in the pan.

  3. Cook slowly, adding more fat if necessary, until medium brown.

Finish and serve

  1. Transfer to a heated platter and pour out most of the grease.

  2. Make a brown sauce in the pan, adding ¼ cup of sauce for full flavor if desired.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Pork + flourtop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Pork and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,187 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Pork tenderloin
Is the main meat, cooked until tender and browned on the outside.
Flour
Coats the meat so it browns more evenly and helps form the pan sauce.
Bacon fat or other drippings
Conducts heat for searing and adds rich, savory flavor to the meat and sauce.

The step that matters

Cook slowly until medium brown. Cooking over moderate heat lets the interior cook through while the flour-coated surface browns gradually. Too much heat would scorch the flour and leave the center underdone.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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