Wienerschnitzel

No, not the South Western chain of hot dog restaurants. This Viennese Schnitzel is made with pork tenderloin, pounded thin, instead of the traditional veal. It is simply covered in fine bread crumbs and fried, topped with eggs and parsley, served with lemon slices. The bread crumbs are made by cutting the sandwich bread into cubes, and microwave to dry them out, then put in a food processor for a full 45-seconds until very fine. The important technique is to constantly swirl the dutch oven while frying, to try to obtain the same undulating texture as the skin of a Shar Pei.

Breaded pork cutlet, served with lemon slices (not pictured, but don't forget them).

Using pork tenderloin, cutting it on a 20-degree bias, and pounding it thin into a pork cutlet meant that the meat didn’t suffer from the rubbery texture of your average pork cutlet.  Overall, a great dinner in about an hour.

Problems:

1. My supermarket tricked me into buy two pork tenderloins, through packaging. I only included the cost of one tenderloin in the $8 price.
2. I didn’t stir the bread cubes enough while microwaving, so they stuck to the plate and cooked unevenly.
3. 7 slices of bread makes your last cutlet difficult to bread. Next time I’m going to use 9 slices.

Rating: 4-star.
Cost: $8 for 4 large servings.
How much work? Low.
How big of a mess? Medium.
Started: 6pm Ready:  7pm.