Baked Pork Chops with Brown Rice and Mushrooms

Sometimes plans change in an instant. That's what happened to us last Sunday. We had planned to have grilled salmon, but Mother Nature had other ideas.  Within 30 minutes we had severe thunderstorm warnings, tornado watches and warnings. We went from daylight to darkness at 11:30 in the morning, definitely not grilling weather with high winds and torrential rain.  Soldier Field was even evacuated, before the start of the Chicago Bears football game. Fortunately, the line of storms missed the western burbs and the city, but did hit in Central Illinois. I don't remember having tornado warnings in November before.  Luckily, I had pork chops in the freezer, which I had intended to make later in the week, using this recipe.

I had not made Baked Pork Chops with Rice in a very long time, and I don't know why. We have just been grilling our chops. Back in the day when I made them, I used white rice, but today I used brown rice, which turned out so well. I also decided to add sliced mushrooms and onions to the brown rice, for added flavor. There are only a few ingredients in this recipe, pork chops, rice, brown or white, water, Cream of Mushroom soup, mushrooms and an onion.This dish can be in the oven in 10 minutes, including browning the chops.  Then the dish bakes for one hour, or until the rice and pork chops are tender.  This dish is so good with tender juicy pork chops, and creamy rice and mushrooms You can have a  meal ready in a little over an hour with the addition of a salad or vegetable. While the dish is baking, you have time to wrap some packages, start to trim your tree, or any other holiday things that you have on your to do list. I'll be making this dish again soon.

Baked Pork Chops with Brown Rice and Mushrooms

Ingredients:

4 1/2” pork chops, bone in
1 c. uncooked brown rice
1/2 lb mushrooms, cleaned and sliced

1 medium yellow onion, sliced
2 c. boiling water

1 can Cream of Mushroom soup, undiluted (I used low sodium)

Directions:

Pre-heat oven to 375 degrees

Spray large frying pan with cooking spray. Brown pork chops over medium heat, set aside. Spray a 13 x9 pan or large casserole dish with cooking spray.  Add uncooked rice, mushrooms, and onion.  Pour boiling water over rice mixture.  Stir to combine.  Lay browned chops over the rice in the pan.  Pour undiluted mushroom soup over top of chops.  Do not mix in rice.  Cover and bake for 1 hour, or until rice is tender.

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