Porc a l'orange with braised fennel

Obviously I don't blog everything I've cooked for the past week but in this case, apart from poached eggs, this is everything I've cooked. A stretch of long days getting the mag 'to bed' (sounds more romantic than it is) haven't been very helpful to fixing dinners (or a general sense of calm, for that matter). Anyway, winter's been bedded, more news on that later, and I could get back to messing about in the kitchen. Sorry for the average pic but the meal was much enjoyed.

The recipe is taken from these French recipes that pop into my email box each day. It's a nice way to pick up some French cooking . You just go to Cuisine AZ and then, and then I'm not sure what you do, you'll have to ask a French person, but eventually you'll get a pork recipe from someone called Emmanuelle and that's good, no? So the recipe:

300 g of pork fillet, sliced into 2cm medallions; 3 oranges - one with the rind grated and juiced and the other two segmented ; one leek, cut into 1cm lengths (the recipe calls for small white onions); butter; salt and pepper

For some nice prep practice, instead of of grating the peel, peel it without the pith, slice it into fine strip and finely chop it. Chop the ends off the other two oranges, remove the peel with a knife and then segment it by slicing between the membrane, avoiding any pith. Segmenting an orange is one of the three things you have to be able to do well before you can be considered able to do anything in cooking school. I forget the other two. Ah well.

Sear the pork in butter until it's golden and then add the leek and the juice and the peel. Cover and simmer for 20 minutes, season, then add the orange segments and simmer for another eight minutes. Remove the pork, the oranges and the leek and keep them warm and reduce the cooking liquid into a sauce - glossing it up a bit with some whisked in butter.

Found this Donna Hay recipe to go with risotto while looking for a way to slow-roast fennel. This recipe calls for braising. A few changes - I replaced chicken stock with beer, vinegar with white verjuice and dropped the amount of sugar back a bit.

2 fennel bulbs, trimmed and quartered; 1 cup of Bitburger; 1/3 cup of raw sugar; 1/3 cup of white verjuice; 4 sprigs of thyme.

Then, in an eerily familiar fasion. sear the fennel in butter until it's golden and then add the other ingredients. Cover and simmer for 8 minutes. Eight minutes isn't enough for tender, so possibly go for at least 15.

Plate it and that's it. The citrus cuts nicely against slightly sweet and fatty pork and braised onions and fennel are your winter heartiness right there.