It’s that good. Seriously. Get the ingredients and make this immediately. The boys wouldn’t eat more than a few bites, but they’re on strike from all meat, so the fact that they actually ate more than one bite is a pretty glowing recommendation. I’m pretty sure if we hadn’t finally cut ourselves off, Mr. Blue and I would have eaten ourselves right into a case of the meat sweats.
I saw this recipe for Brown Sugar Balsamic Pork Tenderloin on Pinterest and immediately pinned it onto my “Mom Cooking” board. That means things that look like they require such a slight amount of work that they are weeknight friendly. The key to this recipe is the sauce, and I think it would be equally divine on chicken. I rubbed the tenderloin with salt, pepper, and garlic and put in the crockpot with some water before we left for work. When we got home, the house already smelled delicious. I decided to finish it off in the oven, brushing it with sauce every few minutes. I didn’t broil it as the recipe suggests, but that would have worked great, too. I just wanted extra layers of the sauce “crust” so I did a lower temp and left it in a bit longer. Either way would make a great crust and it makes it look more “Dinner Party” approved than if you just left it in the crockpot, but I have every intention of just throwing the ingredients for the sauce in the crockpot to start off next time and see how it turns out. If it works, it will instantly become my favorite freezer crockpot meal. I changed just a few things from the original recipe, but it’s hard to mess with perfection.
- pork tenderloin (ours was about 2.5 lbs)
- salt
- pepper
- garlic powder
- 1 tsp. minced garlic (we love us some garlic–so I increased this to about 1 tbsp.)
- ½ c. water
- 1 c. brown sugar
- 2-4 Tbsp. cornstarch
- ½ c. balsamic vinegar
- ½ c. water
- 4 Tbsp. low sodium soy sauce
- Rub salt, pepper, and garlic powder over the pork tenderloin. Add ½ cup of water to the crockpot and place the pork inside.
- Cook the pork on low for 6 hours. Our crockpot just goes to warm after the cooking time, so I started the next step when we got home rather than in the last hour of cooking. The last hour of cooking, in a saucepan mix together garlic, water, brown sugar, 1-2 tsp. cornstarch, balsamic vinegar, and soy sauce together. Bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium and stir. If you need to add more cornstarch to thicken the glaze, add a half tablespoon at a time until the glaze thickens.
- Pour half the sauce in the crockpot directly over the tenderloin. If you want to finish in the crockpot, brush the tenderloin with the remaining sauce every 15 minutes for the last hour. If you want to get the extra yummy crust, remove the meat from the crockpot and place on a pan (cover with foil for easy clean-up because the glaze will stick hardcore to your pan). Brush the glaze on top and broil on high for 2-3 minutes or lower your heat to 325 degrees for about 15-20 minutes, brushing with glaze every 5 minutes.
- Remove from oven and shred the pork. You can add the remaining glaze to the table for those that wish to add more.
I suggest serving it the first night with vegetables of your choice and rice or a dinner roll. For leftovers, I highly recommend it on sandwiches with slaw, quesadillas, in eggs or a breakfast sandwich, on nachos . . . the list goes on and on.
Enjoy!
wonderful grape / 20453 posts
Well. It’s 5:45am and this looks so amazing, I want it NOW. For breakfast. Putting this on the menu this week, this looks amazing! And so much better than the original post
honeydew / 7303 posts
Looks so yummy!
wonderful pomelo / 30692 posts
So… this is embarrassing to admit, but I’ve never used a crockpot before! We have one, I just don’t know how to use it…
When something says to cook for 6 hours – does that mean you set the crockpot to cook for that long, but it will continue to keep the food warm for however long after that? I’m always too afraid to try stuff like this because we’re out of the house for 10-11 hours during the week. Is that too long to be able to cook things in a crockpot??
wonderful pear / 26210 posts
The good thing about pork tenderloin is that you don’t have to put it in the crockpot!
You can totally do it in the oven, it just takes about 30 minutes, and you’ve got dinner on the table!
persimmon / 1081 posts
@Adira: It depends on how fancy your crockpot is. Does your crockpot have a warm setting? My first one didn’t, just low, high, and off. My current one does have a warm setting but the high setting is only for 4 or 6 hours, low for 6 or 8 hours, so some of the fast cooking recipes (say, low for 4 hrs) won’t work if I’m going to be out of the house all day. Also, I find that the warm setting on my crockpot is pretty hot, so if something stays on warm for a long time it gets mushy.
wonderful pomelo / 30692 posts
@mrsmate: Thanks! I’m honestly not sure because I haven’t really inspected it! I’ll have to take it out of the box and see what kind of features it has! If it is fancy enough that I can set it to cook for a certain time and then go to warm, that might work for me? Also – the only fear of it cooking too long is everything getting mushy, right? It’s not like the meat will go bad cooking for 11 hours vs 8, right??
honeydew / 7687 posts
@Adira: I would just put extra water in so it doesn’t burn.
wonderful pomelo / 30692 posts
@scg00387: Thanks for the tip! Maybe I’ll have to experiment on a weekend to ensure the house doesn’t burn down but so that I know if it can go 10-11 hours!
GOLD / wonderful coconut / 33402 posts
@Adira: I think most after the cook time, go to warm. So it should be ok till you get home. Or you can get one with a timer and it won’t start till a certain time if you want.
I pinned this. Going to make next week!
blogger / nectarine / 2600 posts
Ok might have to try this I dont try pork products much as I dont know how to cook them well enough This seems like I might be able to manage
blogger / pomelo / 5361 posts
@mrsmate: @Adira: Yes, it depends on the crockpot. Mine you just set it to high or low and enter the number of hours and then it automatically switches to warm when the time is up. My “warm” setting is pretty hot, so if I’m putting it in the morning, I usually just take off an hour or 2 from the cooking time because i know it will keep cooking some on warm.
@looch: Good point. You can certainly do this in the oven as well. Crockpots just often work better for our schedule.
Also, we’re always gone for at least 10 hours, and I never have a problem with using the crockpot other than veggies like broccoli sometimes get mushy and an alfredo pasta recipe didn’t turn out well because it cooked too high for too long.
GOLD / wonderful apricot / 22646 posts
nom! favoriting!
nectarine / 2771 posts
Yum, must try!
honeydew / 7488 posts
This looks awesome. I use my crockpot a lot to do slow cooking and finish stuff off on the stove and oven as well. Looks delish!
wonderful pomelo / 30692 posts
@Smurfette: @Mrs. Blue: Thanks ladies! I’ll have to inspect our crockpot and see if I can figure out how it works because I REALLY want to try this recipe!!!
apricot / 298 posts
1, what are the meat sweats? It sounds… disgusting.
2, this sounds amazing and is going on next week’s menu plan.
eggplant / 11408 posts
@Adira: ours doesn’t have a warm setting, but I find that it only makes the meat more delicious for it to be in there longer. Just make sure to have enough liquid so it doesn’t burn!
blogger / pomelo / 5361 posts
@abbylyn: Ha! I think the meat sweats might be more urban legend than medical reality, so I use it playfully. But here’s a blog that explains it. http://realdoctorstu.com/2011/08/31/the-mystery-of-the-meat-sweat/
nectarine / 2280 posts
Yumzzzz! I gotta try this out on the weekend.
pomelo / 5820 posts
Ohhh I’m definitely going to try this! Meat sweats… ha!
pineapple / 12793 posts
I pinned and made this a few months ago. So delicious!!!
And I picked up a tenderloin yesterday! Perfect timing!
blogger / wonderful cherry / 21628 posts
That looks good!
blogger / nectarine / 2010 posts
Omg. The meat sweats. Hilarious.
blogger / eggplant / 11551 posts
This looks amazing! I have pork tenderloin defrosting in my fridge and need to figure out how I want to cook it – I think you gave me my answer. Yum!!
blogger / pomegranate / 3491 posts
So I was planning beef stew of some sort for today, had the meat ready for my slow cooker. Saw this first thing this morning, thought “i bet i can dump all those ingredients in with the meat” and voila – my house smells AWESOME. Hopefully the beef version of this is tasty
blogger / nectarine / 2010 posts
My parents are here this week and I have one “free” meal on my menu. I think I may need to get a big hunk ‘o meat and make this! It will make up for the quinoa burritos I served to my dad tonight.
blogger / wonderful cherry / 21616 posts
DH and I were just saying how we never eat pork! May have to try this!
blogger / kiwi / 675 posts
this looks amazing! And I love new slow cooker recipes… thanks blue!
nectarine / 2192 posts
I might have to make that this week. Thanks!
blogger / pomegranate / 3300 posts
Looks delicious!
blogger / watermelon / 14218 posts
I’m already crying! Can’t wait to try this!!
blogger / clementine / 998 posts
mouth watering!
blogger / pear / 1563 posts
This looks so awesome! And we LOVE the crockpot, so I will definitely be trying this!
blogger / nectarine / 2010 posts
I’m making this now and it smells amazing! Just saw one thing in the directions though: you can’t add more cornstarch to a hot liquid. The cornstarch will just get lumpy. So you need to add cornstarch to a little water and then add it to the mixture, if the original amount wasn’t enough Just thought I’d point that out in case anyone else is making this today too!
nectarine / 2180 posts
I made this tonight with pork shoulder and it was delicious! DH thought it would be good over mashed potatoes.
@Mrs. Stroller: I guess I got lucky, because I did add cornstarch to the hot liquid and it turned out lump-free!
blogger / persimmon / 1398 posts
We made this last night… YUM! And thank you!
GOLD / wonderful pea / 17697 posts
@Mrs. Blue: OK, so I made this yesterday. And honestly? I don’t know if I just mismeasured something, but we weren’t super impressed. It was okay, we both definitely finished our plates, but looked at each other with a shrug.
But then today? I heated up some leftovers for lunch? And OMG. I guess all the flavors had more time to hang out, because everything tasted much more balanced, and out of this world good. I ate two plates, and E has finished an entire bowl!
So we’ll definitely keep the recipe, but next time maybe I’ll make it a day before I want to use it
pomegranate / 3863 posts
Made this tonight and LOVED it!! Thank you @Mrs. Blue!!
GOLD / wonderful pomegranate / 28905 posts
@Mrs. Blue: so how long was yours in the crockpot in total? Just checking because if I pull at 6hrs it might not be tender enough.
I think our menu for this week is pretty set so this’ll be for next week!
Meat sweats = truth.
blogger / pomelo / 5361 posts
@locavore_mama: Sorry for the delayed response! Ours was in the crockpot for 6 hours of cooking time and then it switched to the “warm” setting for 3 hours.
persimmon / 1495 posts
I know it’s been awhile, but I just had to post that I made this for the second time tonight. It’s just as good as advertised! Thanks for sharing the recipe
guest
Is there A reason why you just season it and wait six hours to apply the glaze? I wanted to try this but with the glaze on the meat the entire time and brushing up the meat every fifteen minutes during the last hour. Would that mess it up somehow?
guest
The FIRST TIME I made this I automatically doubled the sauce because we LOVE sauce and I added 1 tsp of Ginger, because life NEEDS Ginger (in my humble opinion).
The many other times, I used the sauce…which is FANTASTIC for my Crock Pot Ribs and for Chicken Wings, both as a dip and as a sauce, I’ve used the sauce for burgers and…well…you get the picture…I’m addicted and I’m presently seeking help
THANK YOU FOR SHARING THIS RECIPE
guest
Just perfect I never never use tinfoil I always always use parchment paper never any sticking
guest
I have a friend with celiacs so can’t have soy sauce. Tamari is gluten free. Would it work instead?