Get your prep done. Once you have everything ready, this all comes together quite quickly. If possible, the pork chops you should take out of the fridge well before you fry them to allow them to get up to room temperature (random Jewish syntax there!), pat them dry with some kitchen towels to remove any excess moisture and season them well on both sides with salt and pepper. Whenever any recipe mentions seasoning anything, they just mean add salt and pepper. Wash your hands and any surface the pork touched when you are finished handling the chops. Stray raw pork or chicken bacteria will make you sick.

Chop up your onions, garlic and parsley and get your potatoes ready for whatever method you are using. A nice soft mash would be ideal but I just microwaved my convenient potatoes and they were fine.

Get a small pan of water on the boil for your veg.

The potatoes and sauce take the longest in this recipe but the chops also need to be fried so there is a bit of juggling going on. If you prefer you can make the sauce first and put it aside for a few minutes and reheat when everything else is ready.

For the sauce; Melt the butter with the oil in a middling sized saucepan and gently fry the onion until it softens. Add the garlic and sliced mushrooms and fry until the mushrooms are soft but have not started to collapse and release their liquid. Add the wine and simmer until it has reduced by about half. Stir in the creme fraiche and parsley and heat through. Turn the heat down very low or put aside until all else is ready.

Fry your chops.

Just a quick aside here. I despise the term ‘pan fried’ that has become so fashionable in foody circles in the last few years. It’s as if plain old frying is just common and unappealing and unhealthy but ‘pan frying’ makes it nice and middle class and acceptable. Piss off! What else would you fry anything in but a pan? A toaster? An eggcup? Don’t even get me started on ‘tray roasted’!

I think I’ll go and make myself a cup of tea to calm down, with some freshly kettle boiled water of course. I want to swear a lot right now!

Deep breath.

Put a couple of knobs of butter and some oil in your frying pan. Butter has a low burning point but tastes delicious so the addition of the oil brings the temperature of the pan up while stopping the butter from burning. You don’t need searing hot but you want hot. Gently place your pork chops in the hot butter and oil. A tongs is always useful to protect your hands and arms when frying anything. Leave them alone for a few minutes to cook and brown. Don’t cover the pan or the chops will cook in the steam and end up overdone. You’ll see the colour of the chops change at the side as the heat rises through them. After two or three minutes, depending on the thickness of your cut, flip them over to cook the other side. Give them another two or three minutes then remove them from the pan. You should have your veg on to boil now by the way. Test the chops to check they are sufficiently cooked. Cut through the thickest part and if there is no pink just leave them there to rest. If they need another couple of minutes return them to the pan. When they are ready put them aside while you gather together the rest of your meal.

‘Assemble’ is another foody term that annoys me, like you are putting together flat pack furniture, but assemble we shall. Plate up your pork chops and spuds and green veg and smother the hopefully juicy chops with your creamy mushroom sauce.

Nothing wrong with meat and two veg!