Slow-Cooker Pork Chops — The Six-Cake-Orders Sunday

TCC’s early action decision came in Saturday afternoon at five-oh-three PM Central Time, eight minutes after the official five-PM portal release. I was in the kitchen finishing the second of six pre-Christmas cake orders — a red velvet sheet cake destined for the Hopkins family’s office party in Sapulpa — with my hands covered in cream cheese frosting up to the wrists when the laptop made the soft chime I’d been waiting on for three days. Mama and Cody were both at the kitchen table, deliberately not looking at the laptop, deliberately drinking coffee, deliberately pretending the chime hadn’t happened. I rinsed my hands in the sink, dried them on the dish towel hanging on the oven handle, sat down at the laptop, and refreshed the application portal.

The page loaded with a banner across the top in TCC’s gold and black: “Welcome to TCC.” The acceptance letter was below, two paragraphs of formal acceptance language with my full name in the second sentence and the words “Class of 2023” in the third. I read the letter twice. Then I scrolled down to the financial-aid package, which the office had attached to the same notification because they bundle them for early-action admits with demonstrated need. Full tuition. Full room and board. A three-thousand-dollar annual stipend for books, supplies, travel, and incidentals. The number at the very bottom of the breakdown — the line labeled “Expected Family Contribution” — was zero. Zero dollars. TCC was offering to pay for everything.

I sat down on the kitchen floor with my back against the cabinet and didn’t cry. Mama cried. Cody cried. Cody, who hadn’t cried in front of me even on the night of his arrest, cried for fifteen seconds at the kitchen table with his fist against his mouth. Mama got up, came over, sat down on the floor next to me, put her arm around my shoulders, and just held me there. I sat on the floor with my back against the cabinet and stared at the ceiling for ten full minutes while she held me, and the inside of my chest felt strangely calm, like the calm I’ve heard people describe when they realize something is actually going to be okay after years of preparing for it not to be.

The cake orders had spilled over from Mrs. Patterson’s baby shower in October. Six different families had reached out in the past six weeks asking for Christmas cakes after seeing or hearing about the shepherd’s-pie bites or the strawberry pound cake or the various other things I’d been baking around town. The orders, in the order they came in: a full Italian cream cake for the Bowman family Christmas Eve dinner ($75), two pumpkin spice loaves for a teacher who wanted hostess gifts ($30 for both), a red velvet sheet cake for the Hopkins office party ($55), a chocolate ganache four-layer for a fortieth birthday ($65), and a coconut sheet cake for the Sapulpa High secretaries’ lunch ($60). Total: two hundred and eighty-five dollars due over the next eight days for delivery across the next two weekends. I had the schedule taped to the inside of the pantry door, color-coded by Mama who’d insisted on color-coding it.

Sunday I made slow-cooker pork chops because I needed a dinner that ran itself while I baked all afternoon and didn’t require checking. Slow-cooker pork chops are a recipe you can argue is too easy to be worth a recipe, and I would respond that ease is a feature when your kitchen is already producing two layer cakes simultaneously. Six boneless pork chops — the IGA had them on close-out at three-something a pound — into the slow cooker; one packet of dry onion-soup mix sprinkled over the top; one ten-and-a-half-ounce can of condensed cream of mushroom soup; a half-cup of beef broth poured around the edges. Lid on. Eight hours on low. That’s the entire recipe. The chops come out fork-tender and the mushroom-gravy in the cooker comes out thick enough to spoon over rice or mashed potatoes without further thickening.

I baked the Italian cream and the pumpkin loaves between ten and three. I baked the red velvet sheet cake between three and five. The chocolate ganache and the coconut sheet I had scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday after school. Mama and Cody ate the pork chops at six over rice and started a list of everybody we needed to call about TCC — Aunt Linda, Aunt Patty, Mr. Briggs, Marcus Wells, the Bowmans, Iris (who already knew because I’d called her at five-fifteen). Mama wrote the names on a yellow legal pad in her small block letters. Cody added two of his own — his old Babe Ruth coach, who was now retired and lived in Glenpool, and his uncle on his daddy’s side from Lake Charles. He said both men had asked about me when he’d first gone in.

Eight hours on low, no thickening required. Here’s the four-ingredient build.

Slow-Cooker Pork Chops

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 4 hours | Total Time: 4 hours 10 minutes | Servings: 4

Ingredients

• 4 bone-in pork chops (about 3/4 inch thick)
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
• Salt and black pepper to taste
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 cup chicken broth
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tablespoon cornstarch (optional, for thickening)
• 2 tablespoons cold water (optional, for thickening)
• Fresh parsley, chopped, for garnish

Instructions

1. Season the chops. Pat pork chops dry with paper towels. Mix together garlic powder, onion powder, smoked paprika, thyme, salt, and pepper. Rub the seasoning blend evenly over both sides of each chop.
2. Sear for color (optional but worth it). Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Sear pork chops 2 minutes per side until golden. This step builds flavor — skip it if you’re short on time, but don’t skip it if you have ten minutes to spare.
3. Add to slow cooker. Place the pork chops in the bottom of a 4- to 6-quart slow cooker. Pour chicken broth and Worcestershire sauce over the top.
4. Cook low and slow. Cover and cook on LOW for 4 hours, or until pork is tender and cooked through to an internal temperature of 145°F. Avoid lifting the lid during cooking.
5. Make the pan sauce. Remove chops and set aside. If you’d like a thicker sauce, whisk cornstarch into cold water, then stir into the slow cooker juices. Turn heat to HIGH and cook uncovered for 10 minutes until slightly thickened.
6. Serve. Plate the chops, spoon the pan sauce over the top, and garnish with fresh parsley. Serve with roasted vegetables or mashed potatoes and something good to drink.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 310 | Protein: 34g | Fat: 16g | Carbs: 4g | Fiber: 0g | Sodium: 420mg