Slow-Cooker Curry Pork — The Wednesday Tradition That Endures

October. The leaves. The gold. The world on fire the way only Duluth can be on fire — contained, brief, spectacular. I drove along Skyline Drive on Thursday after the Damiano Center and the view was the same and different and the same. The lake. The city. The trees. The colors that come every year for ten days and then disappear. I pulled over. I didn't cry this time. I just looked. I looked at the city where I was born and the lake where I grew up and the trees that are doing what they always do, which is change and change and change and never stop changing, and I thought: I am these trees. I am the changing. The leaves fall and the branches go bare and winter comes and the tree endures. Paul's eye-tracking is slower. The fatigue that affects his whole body affects his eyes too — by evening, the eyes are tired, the tracking less precise, the letters harder to find. The communication narrows as the day progresses. Morning Paul types full sentences. Evening Paul types single words. Late-night Paul closes his eyes and is silent. The silence is different from the pre-disease silence. The pre-disease silence was full — two people choosing not to speak, comfortable in their shared quiet. The current silence is empty — a person who wants to speak and can't, a machine that requires energy he doesn't have, a conversation that would happen if the body would allow it. I fill the silence with reading. Two hours every night. Sometimes three. I read until Paul's eyes close and the breathing settles and the monitor shows the steady rhythm of sleep. I read him shipwrecks and Swedish novels and sometimes, on the hard nights, I read him Mamma's recipe cards — the handwritten ones, the ones from her kitchen — because the sound of ingredients being listed is its own kind of lullaby. "Flour, three cups. Butter, one-half cup. Sugar, two tablespoons. Cardamom, freshly ground, one teaspoon." The rhythm of measurement. The poetry of cooking. He sleeps to the sound of recipes. I think he would approve of this if he could type it. I made a fall dinner for myself: pork chops with applesauce from the pantry. The Wednesday pork chops. Mamma's tradition. My tradition now. I ate alone at the table while Paul slept in his wheelchair (he dozed after the reading) and Sven lay between us and the house was quiet except for the machines and the October wind. The leaves are falling. The silence is full and empty. The reading continues. The bread bakes every week. The tree endures.

The Wednesday pork is Mamma’s tradition, and now it is mine — a meal that asks very little and gives back warmth, something I needed more than I knew sitting alone at that table with the October wind at the windows and Paul asleep in his chair. This slow-cooker curry pork has become my version of that ritual: the kind of dinner you start in the morning and come home to at the end of a long, narrowing day, when the house is quiet and the machines are running and you need something that has been patiently waiting for you. It is not Mamma’s applesauce recipe, but it is the same idea — pork that is tender and a little sweet, a meal that does not require you to be fully present to make it right.

Slow-Cooker Curry Pork

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 6 hrs | Total Time: 6 hrs 15 min | Servings: 6

Ingredients

• 2 lbs boneless pork shoulder, cut into 1 1/2-inch chunks
• 1 medium yellow onion, diced
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 can (13.5 oz) coconut milk
• 1/2 cup chicken broth
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons curry powder
• 1 tablespoon brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 tablespoon cornstarch mixed with 2 tablespoons cold water (optional, to thicken)
• Cooked rice or flatbread, for serving
• Fresh cilantro or sliced green onions, for garnish (optional)

Instructions

1. Season the pork. Pat pork pieces dry and season lightly with salt and pepper. Place in the bottom of a 5- or 6-quart slow cooker.
2. Build the sauce. In a medium bowl, whisk together coconut milk, chicken broth, soy sauce, curry powder, brown sugar, and ground ginger until smooth.
3. Add aromatics. Scatter diced onion and minced garlic over the pork in the slow cooker, then pour the coconut milk mixture over everything.
4. Cook low and slow. Cover and cook on LOW for 6–7 hours or on HIGH for 3–4 hours, until the pork is fork-tender and pulls apart easily.
5. Thicken if desired. In the last 20 minutes of cooking, stir in the cornstarch slurry and replace the lid. Cook on HIGH until the sauce thickens slightly.
6. Serve. Spoon pork and sauce over steamed rice or alongside flatbread. Garnish with fresh cilantro or green onions if desired.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 380 | Protein: 28g | Fat: 24g | Carbs: 10g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 520mg