A few weeks ago, we took a short vacation with some good friends of ours who have a timeshare at Massanutten, Virginia. Since we were staying in a house with a full kitchen, we made many of our meals at home, rather than going to restaurants for the entire trip. The winner of the weekend was definitely this fall medley tenderloin.
When my friend made this meal for the first time, she used a pork tenderloin. But since my husband and I always have an abundance of venison in the freezer, we brought a few tenderloins with us.
It turned out so delicious that a few weeks later when I got a deer tenderloin out of the freezer for dinner, I decided to use this recipe again. I had just been given a bunch of apples from my grandparents’ trees (applesauce is my project for this weekend!) and I had a pear left over from last week’s farmers’ market trip, plus we had just harvested the sweet potatoes from our garden. Everything seemed to fit together perfectly!
One of the reasons I love this recipe is because it is an entire meal in one dish. While that means less clean-up, it also means that this is not a four-course meal! Sure, it is missing a veggie, but I think a sweet onion chopped into chunks would make a nice addition. And really, if you want a vegetable with your meal, you can make whatever you’d like! A jar of home canned green beans would accompany this dish nicely! As for me, I’ll probably just eat an extra pickle for a snack.
Also, there are some ingredients added to this dish to increase some of the sweetness, like honey and brown sugar. The apples and pears are sweet to begin with, and baking them draws out the sugars, so if you’d like to forego the brown sugar, and maybe even the honey, go for it!
The amount of apples, pears, and sweet potatoes can vary based upon your specific tastes. Or what is available in your house at the time! An equal amount of each is great, but if you’d like more sweet potatoes and less pears, go for it!
I recommend baking this dish for 30 minutes at 400 degrees. This time will depend on the thickness of the tenderloin. If you get to the point where the fruits and potatoes are very soft and the meat is still not done, just scoop out the fruit and put the meat back in the oven until it has reached the proper temperature. (I ran into this issue because the tenderloin I was cooking was rather thick and it was not completely thawed when I put it in the oven. Oops!)
This is a great quick and simple fall recipe that takes a little bit of chopping, but once that is finished, it is a piece of cake! I hope you give this recipe a try, and if you do, I’d love to hear how it turned out!
Ingredients
- Venison or Pork Tenderloin
- 2 Pears
- 3 Small Apples
- 2 Large Sweet Potatoes
- 2 Tbsp. Honey
- 2 Tbsp. Brown Sugar
- 2 tsp. Cinnamon
Instructions
- Chop pears, apples, and sweet potatoes into bite-sized pieces.
- Place tenderloin in a glass baking dish.
- Cover tenderloin and fill baking dish with chopped fruits and potatoes.
- Drizzle honey over the top.
- Sprinkle top with brown sugar and cinnamon.
- Bake in 400 degree oven for 30 minutes or until fruits and potatoes are soft and meat is cooked to appropriate internal temperature.
