Recipe: Costolette di Maiale alla Griglia (Italy) Grilled Pork Chops with Juniper and Fennel Marinade

Winner of the James Beard/ KitchenAid Cookbook of the Year 2000 and Winner of the Beard Award for the Best Writing on Food 2000.

October 21, 2019

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Grilled Pork Chops with Juniper and Fennel Marinade
Costolette di Maiale alla Griglia
Region: Italy
Category: Pork-Grilled
Season: Summer
Difficulty: Easy but special equipment needed and long cooking and/or non-working time

Pork chops grilled with juniper and fennel was a favorite recipe of the great English food writer Elizabeth David. I've adapted her recipe but kept the chops rustic and succulent.

[photo: Clifford A. Wright]

Yield: Makes 6 servings
Preparation Time: 4:30 hours

1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 tablespoon fennel seeds, ground

2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped

10 dried juniper berries, ground

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

6 pork chops (about 2 1/2 pounds), cut 1 inch thick

1. Stir together the mixture of olive oil, fennel seed, garlic, juniper berries, salt and pepper, to taste, in a ceramic or glass pan. Dip each side of the pork chop in this mixture and then leave to marinate in the refrigerator for 4 hours, turning several times.

2. Prepare a charcoal fire or preheat a gas grill for 15 minutes on high.

3. Remove the pork chops from the marinade and place with any marinade ingredients adhering to them on the grill. Cook, turning only once, until golden with black grid marks, about 7 minutes on each side. Serve hot.

Variation:

Note:

Posted: 12/28/2006

If there is a cookbook of the year, this [Mediterranean Feast] is it. A remarkably ambitious work....The subject is vast, the scope of time daunting, but Wright comes across as a cheerful, dedicated scholar who was sorry when he had to stop. Recipes are written to be accessible to contemporary cooks.
- William Rice, Chicago Tribune

If you believe that vegetables are the keystone to a sound diet, and if you believe, as more than a few influential cooks do, that many vegetables are best-- and best prepared— in countries that surround the Mediterranean Sea, this [book Mediterranean Vegetables] may prove to be the best of all possible books. This is a lively reference book that contains a generous number of workable recipes. Here’s a book that’s likely to make the commute from bedside table to kitchen and back frequently. Voted Top 10 Cookbooks of 2001
- William Rice, Chicago Tribune

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