Mojo-Marinated Pork Tenderloin

[amazon-product alink="#0000ff" height="240" width="120"]0761120149[/amazon-product]My wife Michelle and I tried this last night and it was excellent. In fact, it was so tender that my wife was able to cut her tenderloin with her fork. No kidding!

The recipe we followed was in Steven Raichlen’s “How to Grill” BBQ cookbook (page 126) but it’s also easy enough to find online as well.

Here’s one that’s pretty close.

NOTE: We used cilantro instead of parsley and grilled some onion steaks with some of the marinade, which was a nice side dish.

Mojo-Marinated Pork Tenderloin

A lively herb-and citrus-perfumed cross between a sauce and a relish, Cuban inspired mojo makes a potent marinade and sauce for tenderloin. We picked up the idea in south Florida, but the Caribbean sparkle seems even finer in a cooler clime.

Serves 6

Mojo Marinade and Sauce
Juice of 3 large oranges (approximately 1-1/2 cups)
Juice of 2 large limes
6 tablespoons olive oil
1/3 cup minced fresh parsley
2 tablespoons minced fresh oregano
1 teaspoon salt
2 plump garlic cloves, minced

Two 12-ounce to 14-ounce sections of pork tenderloin
Avocado slices and red-ripe tomato slices, for garnish

At least 2-1/2 hours and up to the night before you plan to grill the pork tenderloins, mix the mojo ingredients in a small bowl. Place the tenderloins in a plastic bag and pour about two-thirds of the mojo over them; cover the remaining mojo. Refrigerate the pork and the remaining mojo, which will become a sauce.

Remove the pork from the refrigerator, drain it, and blot any excess moisture from it. Let the pork sit covered at room temperature for 20 to 30 minutes.

Fire up the grill for a two-level fire capable of cooking first on high heat (1 to 2 seconds with the hand test) and then on medium heat (4 to 5 seconds with the hand test).

Transfer the tenderloins to the grill, arrange them so that the thin end is angled away from the hottest part of the fire. Grill the tenderloins uncovered on high heat for 3 minutes, rolling them on all sides. Move the tenderloins to medium heat and estimate the rest of the cooking time according to the thickness of the meat. Thin tenderloins (about 1-1/2 inches in diameter) need an additional 10 to 12 minutes on medium, and fat ones (about 2-1/2 inches in diameter) require up to 25 minutes. Continue rolling the meat on all sides for even cooking. The pork is done when its internal temperature reaches 155 degrees F. to 160 degrees F.

If grilling covered, sear the tenderloins first on high heat uncovered for 3 minutes, rolling them on all sides. Finish the cooking with the cover on over medium heat for at least 8 to 10 minutes (for 1-1/2 inch diameter meat) or up to 20 minutes (for 2-1/2 inch diameter meat).

Carve the pork into thin slices, garnish with avocado and tomato and serve hot accompanied by the reserved mojo. For a fiesta, serve a salad of black beans, rice, corn, and red bell peppers followed by Pina Colada Pinapple Spears.

Technique Tip:

Consider turning this tenderloin into a sandwich, the way most mojo-flavored pork is served in Florida. On toasted Cuban bread or a split crusty roll, pile the meat, a slice of ham, black beans, and sharp cheese, all topped with more mojo. Immensely sloppy and intensely good, the sandwich demands lots of napkins.

Recipe from:
[amazon-product align="left" alink="#0000FF" height="240" width="120"]1558322914[/amazon-product]
by Cheryl Alters Jamison and Bill Jamison
The Harvard Common Press

Born to Grill

Source: http://www.globalgourmet.com/food/egg/egg0798/mojo.html

Wine Making Using Household Items

Here’s another interesting video that I found on YouTube that shows you how to make wine using store bought grape juice.

 
This type of wine would probably fall under the “Baby Duck” category – easy to drink and it’ll give you a good buzz, but not something that’s going to win any awards.

If you make this wine let me know how it turns out!

- Scott “The Wine Making Guy”

How To Make Wine From Coca Cola

Have you ever considered making wine from Coca Cola?

I can’t really say I had … at any point in time, but I came across this video on YouTube and it peaked my interest.

See for your selfL

Sounds tempting until you see what happens when he tastes his wine “experiment” …

So what do you think? Something you’d try?

- Scott “The Wine Making Guy”

Do You Have A Quick Apple Cider Recipe?

Peter, one of my loyal wine making participants from the UK sent me this message today about getting a recipe for apple cider and I thought it would make for a great “Question of the Week”. Enjoy!

Hi Scott

Hows are things? You dont happen to have a easy recipe for cider?

I have aquired about 30 to 40 pound of apples but not sure of the best way to make a gallon of cider or more if i can, out of the apples.

Hope to here from you soon,

Good health

Peter

I tracked down this recipe online for him that sounded tasty:

APPLE CIDER

Makes 1 Gallon — for larger quantities, multiply everything except the yeast, which is sufficient up to 5 gallons.

14-16 lbs Apples (or 1 gallon of juice)
1/2 cup Dextrose
1/2 tsp Pectic Enzyme
1/2 tsp Andovin Super Nutrient
1 Campden Tablet (crushed)
1 pkg Lalvin EC-1118 Wine Yeast

Cut apples into smaller pieces, which will help in juice extraction. Crush, press, and add juice to primary fermenter with all ingredients except wine yeast. Cover primary.

Pressing: if a fruit press is not available, add fruit to a nylon straining bag. Strain out juice, and when finished, tie the bag up & add it to the primary fermenter as well.

After 24 hours, strain the juice from the pulp, & discard straining bag. Add yeast.

Rack to secondary carboy after SG drops below 1.010. Rack again when fermentation is complete (SG below 0.999), or in 3 weeks — whichever is later.

Fining & Stablilizing: If you are NOT going to sparkle your cider, you should add 1/2 tsp of Potassium Sorbate per gallon to stabilize the yeast. After this is done, you’ll be able to sweeten your cider to your liking. A clarifier may also be added.

Racking: Any further racking should be done with the addition of 1 (crushed) Campden tablet per gallon.

Sparkling Cider: When ready to bottle, add 1/4 cup dissolved table sugar PER GALLON to an empty pail. Syphon the cider into the pail, give a quick stir, and bottle into beer bottles (or pop bottles, or Champagne bottles), and cap accordingly.

Allow to sit 4 weeks before sampling. Age in a cool, dark place.

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The original can be found at: http://www.homecraft.on.ca/recipes/applecider.htm

I should also mention that there is also an Apple Cider recipe in The Winemaker’s Recipe HandbooK as well. It is recipe number #4 on page 3.

If you end up making the recipe please let me know how it turns out!

- Scott

Chili Wine Recipe

I received an email the other day from Mervyn who asked:

Hi Scottie,

I had sent you an email regarding a wine we use to have in India called Otty (I am not sure of the spelling) It was prepared with red chillies . It had a pungent taste like ginger wine. I would like to try out this wine. Could you help me ?

- Mervyn

I personally have never heard of Otty nor made a wine made from red chillies so had to do some hunting and here is what I found at: www.about-wine.net/chili-wine-recipe.htm.

If you’ve ever made wine from chillies let me know how it turned out!

- Scott “The Wine Making Guy”

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Chili Wine Recipe

• 8-10 ripe (red) chillies
• 1 lb golden raisins, chopped or minced
• 2 lbs finely granulated sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp acid blend
• 1/2 tsp pectic enzyme (Pectinase)
• Water to one gallon
• 1 crushed Campden tablet
• 1 tsp yeast nutrient
• Pasteur Champagne Yeast

Make sure you wear rubber gloves, wash Chilli peppers and cut off stems.

Put peppers in blender or food chopper with 1-2 cups water and chop coarsely. Chop or mince raisins.

Put raisins in nylon straining bag and, over primary, pour chopped Chilli peppers in with raisins. Tie bag and leave in primary.

Add remaining ingredients except for pectinase and yeast.

Stir well to dissolve sugar. Cover primary and set aside 12-24 hours.

Add pectinase, cover and set aside another 12-24 hours. Add yeast and recover primary. Stir daily for 4-5 days.

Wear rubber gloves, squeeze nylon bag.

Transfer liquid to secondary and fit airlock. Ferment to absolute dryness (roughly S.P.G 990).

Rack into clean secondary and refit airlock. Rack twice more, 30 days apart.

Wait final 30 days and rack into bottles.

(I prefer to make a sugar syrup and measure the amount i need in liquid volume)
You can also substitute this yeast for Lalvin E-1118 which i found will just about ferment a gumboot.. LOL

Good luck and let us know how you go.

Blending Homemade Wine – The Keys To Creating A Truly Unique Wine You Can Call Your Own

The home wine makers may want to blend wines in order to improve the taste of a particular wine. This is different than commercial wineries that blend wines in order to create consistency in the wines that they sell.

To be able to calculate how to properly blend wines, it is recommended that the home winemaker use the Pearson Square because it is a visual math tool that can help determine values when blending wines and it is a tool that anyone can use.

Pearson’s Square:

	Acidity Level	Desired Level	Parts
Wine A	A (1.2)		D (0.4)
Desired Wine (Wine C)		C (0.8)
Wine B	B (0.5)		E (0.3)

Let us look at an example of using this simple application. Let us say that you have two wines, and one has an acid level of 1.2 and the other is 0.5. Let us say further that you want the end acid result to be .8. The top left corner (A) and the bottom left corner (B) represent the acid level of the two wines you are trying to blend. The center number in the square (C) is the desired acid level. The two numbers on the right are numbers that you calculate. Square D (0.4) is the difference between square A (1.2) and square C (0.8); in addition, the square E (0.3) is the difference between square B (0.5) and square C (0.8).

You now have the numbers 0.4 and 0.3. This creates a 4 to 3 ratio of the wines. When you blend these two wines, you will use four parts of the first wine for every three parts of the second wine in order to get an acid level of 0.8. This simple calculation is already taking you down the road of creating the blended wine that you desire.

There are certain rules that should be followed when attempting to blend two wines:

• Blend two wines at a time in small quantities. Make sure you write down the results.
• Filter the wine after you blend.
• Spit don’t swallow when testing.
• Blend two similar wines of the same year.
• Wait a day before blending large quantities and retest your final formula.
• Test with the end product in mind. What is it you want to improve?
• Need some inspiration? Go to your local wine store and see what commercial wineries have blended.

If you follow these simple ways you should be able to make your own wine blend with fantastic results.

Interested In Learning More?

Here are some great resources I have found online that you should consider having a look at:

• Using Pearson’s Square (PDF) (from the North Texas Wine Makers Guild)
• Person’s Square Calculator (Excel Spreadsheet) (from the North Texas Wine Makers Guild)
• Tim Patterson’s Blending Spreadsheet (from WineMaker Magazine)

Scott “The Wine Making Guy”

How to Make Homemade Wine from Store Bought Grape Juice

I found this video on YouTube and it had me wondering how many people make wine from store bought grape juice.

Have a look at the video and let me know if this is something you’d try yourself. I’m certainly not knocking the video or this wine – just not something that I had thought of …

Would love to hear what you think so be sure to leave a comment!

- Scott “The Wine Making Guy”

Cherry Wine Recipe Used As Part Of The Cherry Wine Project

Here’s the cherry wine recipe that I am following for my batch wine that will be featured as part of The Cherry Wine Project (as found on page 8 of the “Winemaker’s Recipe Handbook” by Raymond Massaccesi):

CHERRY, Sweet:

>> Please note that this recipe produces 1 gallon of wine so multiply as appropriate to the size of batch you would like.

6lb Mixed Cherries

1/2 pt Grape Concentrate (we used both red and white)

7 pts Water

2 3/4 lb Sugar (granulated)

3/4 tsp Pectic Enzyme

1 tsp Yeast Nutrient

1 Campden, crushed

1 pkg Sherry or Port Yeast

Starting S.G. 1.100 – 1.110

Method:

1. Wash, remove stems and leaves, and remove pits (use a pitter — either mechanical or a couple of extra hands from around the house). Be careful not to break the bitter pits.

2. Using a nylon straining bag mash and squeeze out juice into straining bag, tie top and place in primary.

Note: We used an actual fruit press to press the cherries and to remove the juice. We then added the cherry skins to a cheese cloth “sock”, which we then put into the primary.

3. Stir in all other ingredients EXCEPT the yeast. Cover primary.

4. After 24 hours add the yeast.

5. Stir daily, check S.G. and press pulp lightly to aid extraction.

6. When ferment reaches S.G. 1.030 (about 5 days) strain juice from bag. Syphon wine off sediment into carboy (secondary). Attach airlock.

7. When ferment is complete (S.G. has dropped to 1.000 — about 3 weeks) syphon off sediment into a clean secondary. Reattach airlock.

8. To aid clearing syphon again in 2 months and again if necessary before bottling.

Cherry Varieties:

Most cherry trees do not adapt well to a mild winter climate. The handsome trees, the crown of flowers in spring, and the fruit, whether sour, sweet or crosses, make them highly desirable.

Sour varieties include: Montmorency, North Star, Early Richmond and Meteor.

Sweet varieities include: Bing, Royal Ann, Van and Lambert.

If you’re interested in reading more blog articles on cherry wine (and other related recipes) consider reading the following articles in the blog-o-sphere:

Commercial Cherry Wine - I’m still trying to get the hang of cherry wine, but while I tinker and tweak I might be able to buy some from the Ten Spoon Vineyard. This Montana winery uses Lambert cherries from Flathead Lake to make a dry red wine. … Cherry Wine (Turnovers) - While just cranking open a can of pie filling and dumping it into a pre-made crust may come out of the oven looking like you made cherry pie, well, sorry kids, that’s not good cherry pie. Besides the surreal color kind of frightens me. … By the river with my cherry cherry wine… - Wouldn’t it be nice if, like Spider-Man, you could have a nasty black alien substance on which to blame your faults, lapses of judgment, and bouts of rage… you know, like when you backhand your girlfriend to the ground. … Cherry Wine - North Star cherries make the BEST wine!! While it WASN’T raining, yesterday, we picked and processed 90 pounds, (picture) and then went out again and picked another 30 pounds! That means enough cherries to make 120 bottles of wine. … Chocolate Cherry Wine, and Everything’s Fine - I saw a recipe the other day for chocolate cupcakes with cabernet sauvignon wine and thought I should try substituting that with a local cherry wine because it goes beautifully with chocolate. I did… I deem that experiment a success. … Cherry Wine? - Before I get back to the wine, I’d like to note the enjoyment I received from shopping at Aligra Wine and Spirits. The individual that was working at Aligra was very helpful in helping me select a Scotch to purchase for my Dad for … Tabor Hill Cherry Wine… - We found this wine from Tabor Hill at the local grocery. Checking their website they have many varieties of wine and I hope to find more and try them. Label: 8.5 – Cute yet artistic, simple and eye catching. Aroma: 8 – it’s cherry all … Strawberry Wine, Gold Wine, Rhuberb Wine and Cherry Wine! - Back in Michigan, they actually have wineries that produce a cherry wine. Don’t ask me about logistics, because honestly, I would probably just make something up. I of course bought some Traverse City Cherry Wine, Spiced Cherry Wine, …

Prawn Wine Anyone? Proof That You Can Make Wine Out Of Just About Anything!

One of the things I love about helping people with their wine making is hearing about all of the crazy things people make wine out of! I guess I’m a “traditionalist” though as I typically make wine from wine kits and fresh fruit.

For example, I currently have the following wine kits from Winexperts on the go:

1. Piesporter (Vintner’s Reserve)
2. Pinot Noir (Vintner’s Reserve)
3. Napa Valley Stag’s Leap District Merlot (Estate Series)(my wife and I are big fans of Stag’s Leap Artemis, which is a Cabernet Sauvignon so we thought this kit would be interesting to try – cost us $150 though so BETTER be good … ).You can view the PDF for this one by clicking here.
4. Chocolate Raspberry Port (Limited Edition)(one of my readers has made this kit as well and said it was a big hit at Christmas)

On the fruit side I currently have on the go:

1. Blueberry Wine
2. Crabapple Wine

I have also completed a batch of Canadian Wheat Ale, which is quite tasty (need to tone down the carbonation though) and have a Mexican style beer waiting for it’s turn as well.

So needless to say, our house has been a perpetual “fermentation zone” for quite some time now.

In any event, I figured the wines that I make are pretty much what everyone else makes and man was I wrong!

In fact, it wasn’t until a couple of years ago that I discovered that people actually make wine out of “non-grape” fruit as well. My ski patrol friend Brian, for example, loves making wine from rhubarb, choke cherries and raspberries and this is mainly because he both loves the wine he can produce and he gets his fruit for free (not a bad deal).

Then there were the wines made from fruits I’ve never heard of including:

1. Pomerac
2. Otaheite Apple (Pomarosa, Malacca Apple, Plum Rose)
3. Samarangense

Next, there was Rob who emailed me today and mentioned that he was making wine from Ribena. Well … I guess all you need is sugar right?

There’s Peter from the UK who loves to make wine from Beetroot (claims it went over quite nicely).

>> By the way, he sent me the recipe if you’d like it. You can contact me by going to www.AllWineMaking.com/Contactus.html

Then there’s Ian (also from the UK) who I think gets the award for pushing the wine making limits with his wine made from:

1. Tomatoes
2. Coconuts (ok … this one doesn’t sound toooo bad)
3. Sycamore (maple)
4. Prawns (yes … that’s right … prawns … as in … shrimp)

Don’t believe me that you can make wine from prawns? Here’s Ian’s recipe and I double dare ya to try it!

“You have to cook and blend 1lb of prawns in with flour, I found that half a banana helped with them . Get it to room temperature, add 2 lbs of sugar, leave them for a few days and then add the yeast. ” -> He did admit though that it took him a few tries to “get it just right”

I could go on with a bunch more entertaining wine recipes that I’ve heard but I’ll spare you the details.

It goes to show you though that once you feel you have your wine making skills honed and under control that you shouldn’t just limit yourself to just one style of wine as you never know what new and exciting flavours are waiting for you just around the corner.

It’s just a matter of getting out of your comfort zone and trying something completely different.

Now get out there and make some wine damn it!

To your wine making,

Scott
www.AllWineMaking.com