Cooking: Pork with gnocchi

Last night I cooked a Nigela Lawson recipe, with a few twists of my own. This is a great recipe, tastes impressive, has a hint of indulgence and is a little out of the ordinary. However, it is simple to cook and can be done within twenty minutes. Great for entertaining one evening after work.

I couldn't find the recipe on the web (anyone would think Nigela wanted people to buy her books), so you will have to put up with my poor imitation. I was cooking for three people.

Ingredients:
Three pork chops or pork steaks. Use a rolling pin to flatten them out so they are faster to cook.
300g of gnocchi (approx)
Handful of mushrooms, chopped
Small glass of white wine
2 (heaped) tsp of whole grain mustard
A dash of cream
Green beans

Method:
- Boil two pans of water. Add the gnocchi to one pan.
- While the gnocchi is cooking fry the pork in a little olive oil in a hot pan. They should only take a couple of mins on each side as they have been bashed out thinly.
- Once the gnocchi has risen to the top if the pan it is cooked. This will probably happen when you turn the pork for the first time. Drain.
- When the pork is cooked remove from the frying pan. Add the mushrooms and cook for a couple mins.
- Meanwhile put the green beans in the second pan of boiling water and cook until al dente.
- Add the wine to the frying pan with the mushrooms. After a minute add the whole grain mustard and cream. Stir well and combine to make the sauce.
- Once the sauce is gently simmering add the gnocchi to the frying pan and mix well in the sauce.
- Assemble on three plates. Spoon a little of the excess sauce over the pork.

Nigela's recipe uses cider instead of white wine. It also doesn't include the mushrooms or green beans, but I think the recipe is a bit devoid of vegetables without!

This is the third or fourth time I have cooked this dish and to be honest I wasn't as wowed as the previous times. The sauce missed a slight tang that it has had before. I used white wine as we had a bottle open, perhaps I should have stuck to the cider.