Fig Balsamic and Rosemary Roasted Pork Loin with Carrots and Potatoes

Timing is everything. Sometimes planning a meal for company can be daunting especially when you want the vegetables, starch and protein to be ready all at the same time. What if you cooked them all together in the same roasting pan? Not only does this recipe make the timing work perfectly but who wants to wash all those pots and pans anyway? Pork can sometimes turn out dry and tasteless.  Remember, your meat thermometer is your friend. Roast this pork loin to an internal temperature of 140 degrees F, let it rest for 15 minutes and you’ll be surprised at how tender and juicy pork can be. Our fig balsamic and the fresh rosemary pair extraordinarily well in this dish which is a good thing because not only is it a marinade for the pork, it’s also a basting liquid and a flavorful sauce at the end.

INGREDIENTS

• 4-pound boneless pork loin roast
• 2 pounds small red potatoes, halved or quartered if large in size
• 1½ pounds carrots, about 8-10, peeled and thickly sliced diagonally

MARINADE

• ½ cup Olive This! Fig Balsamic Vinegar
• 1 tablespoon tomato paste
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh rosemary
• ¼ cup Olive This! Garlic Olive Oil
• 1 tablespoon kosher salt
• 2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced or pressed through a garlic press

DIRECTIONS

Whisk together all the marinade ingredients in a small bowl.

Place the pork loin into a zipper-locking plastic bag and add the marinade. Seal the plastic bag letting out as much air as possible. Marinate the pork in the fridge for about 2½ to 3 hours.

About 30 minutes before the pork loin is finished marinating, chop the carrots and potatoes. Some potatoes may be larger than the others but aim for cutting them to similar sized pieces. Same goes for the carrots (the narrow ends of the carrots are cut a little longer). Uniform pieces cook more consistently.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. When the pork is done marinating, remove it from the plastic bag.  When removing, use the inside of the bag to wipe the marinade off the pork loin retaining as much marinade as possible within the bag. The marinade will be used for basting during cooking. You can tie the roast with kitchen string (also called butcher’s twine). This is an optional step, however, tying the roast not only presents better looking slices but ensures consistency so it cooks more evenly. There are many fancy ways to tie a roast especially if the roast is stuffed and you need to keep the filling from leaking out. However, we kept it simple with five pieces of string tied about 1½ inches apart from each other and we used easy double knots. Of course you can tie the roast before marinating but for some reason we felt the roast could absorb more flavor if it marinated without being tied.

Place the chopped potatoes and carrots into a roasting pan or large baking dish. Add all of the marinade from the bag plus 1 cup of water and stir well to evenly coat the potatoes and carrots.

Nestle the pork loin among the coated carrots and potatoes and place in the preheated oven.

Roast until a meat thermometer inserted into the middle of the roast registers 140 degrees F. This should take about 1 to 1¼ hours however use the meat thermometer often for the best results. Twice throughout the roasting time (say every 20-25 minutes), turn the roast and give the potatoes and carrots a stir.

When the roast is done, transfer to a cutting board and tent with foil letting it rest for 15 minutes. The meat will still continue to cook while it rests and the internal temperature will increase slightly. While the meat rests, increase the oven heat to 450 degrees F and continue to roast the carrots and potatoes. After the 15 minutes, remove carrots and potatoes from oven and transfer to a serving dish. Reserve basting liquid as a sauce.

Slice the pork loin roast into ½-inch slices. Serve along with roasted carrots and potatoes spooning the remaining sauce over the pork slices. Enjoy!

SERVES 5-6

Have a comment? We’d love to hear from you. Have you tried this dish? Do you have a variation that you think others will enjoy? Leave us a comment below.