Pork tenderloin recipe a winner

Pork tenderloin, cranberries, hazelnuts and canned chipotle peppers. In Penny Kazmier's hands those ingredients morphed into Stuffed Pork Tenderloin with Root Beer Adobo Glaze, Sweet Potato Hash and Cranberry Chutney. And with that dish Kazmier evolved from a South Barrington mom with a passion for feeding people into the Daily Herald Cook of the Year 2011.

Kazmier bested three other finalists at a live cook-off, the culmination of the Daily Herald's Cook of the Week Challenge, to win a suite of prizes that included a Solaire Infrared grill valued at $3,600.

To make it to the cook-off Kazmier, along with fellow finalists Cate Brusenbach of Antioch, Michael Lalagos of Schaumburg and Mark Clemens of Elgin, survived two earlier rounds of recipe challenges that started back in September with a pool of 16 home cooks from around the suburbs.

“I'm just so glad someone likes my food,” Kazmier said after five judges selected her dish as the winner, narrowly edging past Brusenbach's Pork Tenderloin Rondele with Carrot Ginger Puree.

As second place finisher, Brusenbach won a meet-and-greet with TLC's Cake Boss, Buddy Valastro, when he performs at the Rosemont Theatre later this month.

Each finalist had the same four challenge ingredients that had to be featured in their dishes as well as access to an array of common pantry items like vinegar, wine, chicken stock, sweet potatoes, onions and oranges. They had one hour to prep, cook and plate their recipes.

The judges took their time sampling each recipe, then sampling again before determining the winning dish.

Today on Page 3 we share Kazmier's winning recipe and what the judges had to say about it. We'll publish the three other cook-off recipes in a special section on Nov. 16.

Stuffed Pork Tenderloin with Root Beer Adobo Glaze, Sweet Potato Hash and Cranberry Chutney