just call me Ina (does that make Austin Jeffrey?)

We invented two more recipes tonight. One was rather eh but we think we know why. The other was delicious. The "eh" entry was a glaze for pork chops; in retrospect, it should be a marinade instead. We used butterflied boneless loin chops and even tenderized them in advance, but the meat was still pretty flavorless on the inside.

Peach Glaze for Pork that Should Be a Marinade

1/4 cup peach preserves
1 Tablespoon chili paste (the asian kind with crushed red pepper flakes in it)
1 Tablespoon apple cider vinegar
2 teaspoons soy sauce

We mixed this up and then heated it, and poured it over both sides of the pork. We recommend marinating for at least three hours before pan-searing the chops (we used two butterflied chops, which is the equivalent of four loin chops). Cook in a hot nonstick or cast iron skillet until the glaze starts to caramelize and the chops aren't pink in the center.

Delicious side dish:

Mashed Turnips with Thyme

2 lbs turnips
1/2 stick (4 T.) butter
2 tablespoons fresh thyme, chopped
1/4 cup sour cream

Trim and peel the turnips, then chop them into big chunks (about six pieces per turnip). Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil and add the turnips; boil until tender, probably about 15 mins. While the turnips cook, melt the butter in a small skillet over medium heat and then saute the thyme in the melted butter until fragrant and the butter just barely starts to darken. When the turnips are tender, drain and mash by hand with a potato masher (ours is metal and wavy and works great, but it will scratch nonstick). Stir in the thyme butter and the sour cream and season well with salt and pepper.

We served the pork and the mashed turnips with Broccoli Blasted, which is a revelation of this oft-maligned vegetable. I seriously can't recommend it enough; we tried it at the Black Bottle in Seattle and literally inhaled a gigantic platter of it. The Epicurious recipe says it feeds four-to-six but that is very unlikely. We used more like 2 lbs of broccoli crowns and only had a bit left, just the two of us. Yum.

It's bedtime for Bonzo (why do I say that? Mom, what does that mean?). We went to the Titans game today (watched from an Executive Suite, if you can believe it) and did a lot of walking to avoid paying for parking or being stuck in traffic. We walked up to the Frist Center after the game and saw the Georgia O'Keeffe exhibit, which was lovely. Sometimes I miss her the way I miss Julia Child. And my grandmothers. That's weird, right? It's unseasonably warm in Nashville; honestly, it's been the most gorgeous fall that you could even imagine. But that means I spent most of this day uncomfortably sweaty, and hoofing it up Broadway in mid-afternoon definitely counts as cardio. The moral of this story: I'm beat, and for once it's for a legitimate reason.

P.S. We think that Cialis commercial with the old people sitting in side-by-side bathtubs in the woods or on top of a cliff is ridiculous. Bathtubs are heavy! Who hauls a bathtub (let alone TWO) out into the woods or up on a cliff just to sit naked in it next to their (presumed) wife of 40 years? And there is no running water up there, so did they haul the water in buckets too? Heat it over a fire? I doubt it. I bet those old folks are just sitting naked in empty bathtubs and feeling smug about what a great photo opportunity it all is.