Oven-pan meals offer big flavors with easy cleanup
Sheet-pan meals are up and coming. They are simple, convenient and the best part is you have only one dish to wash. There are even entire cookbooks devoted to the topic.
To embrace the concept, I wanted recipes that were thrilling. Recipes that would make you look at your sheet pan in a whole new way.
I began by broiling steak in a sheet pan, and I’m glad I did.
Maybe it was the bluecheese butter with a little fresh thyme that I used to finish the steak when it was done. Maybe it’s the inherent beefiness of a rib-eye. Maybe it is the colorful combination of green beans and grape tomatoes that I cooked on the same sheet.
Regardless, it tasted great.
Next up was a pan full of pork chops with roasted apples and Brussels sprouts. Apples go with pork chops like blue cheese and butter go with steaks. But actually, I think the Brussels sprouts are what make this dish so excellent.
Pork chops are a little sweet for a meat, of course, and apples are a little sweeter. When you add brown sugar and cinnamon to the mix, that only intensifies the effect.
So what you need is a counterbalance. A healthy splash of apple-cider vinegar helps, but it is the Brussels sprouts, with their bitter, cabbagelike taste, that makes this dish such a winner. Caramelized with a slight char from broiling, these veggies are addictive.