I always love a good, hearty sandwich for dinner. (Especially in the summer when we’ve been out and about and spending the day grazing!). For me, the star of this show was the simplified homage to kimchi (which I love but am in the minority in my house). Using the thinly sliced pork chops means it comes together in minutes on the grill if you’ve prepped the veggies before.

Pickled Vegetables

1/2 English cucumber, thinly sliced
1/2 onion (red or white), thinly sliced
1 carrot peeled and grated
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp sea salt
3/4 tsp crushed red pepper
1/4 cup white wine vinegar
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

Meat

6 – 8 thinly sliced pork chops
Chinese Five Spice
Black pepper
olive oil

To Finish

4 Ciabatta rolls
Chopped fresh cilantro
Mayo

Combine all the ingredients for the pickled vegetables (a mason jar works perfectly for this). Refrigerate for at least 6 hours to let the flavors combine, shaking periodically to get everything nice and blended.

On cook day, brush the chops with the oil and coat with pepper and the five spice. Grill until barely pink in the center (it will depend on how thin the pork is – the ones I used were super thin and took about 8 minutes total).

For the last minute the pork is grilling, place the rolls cut side down on the grill to toast them lightly. Remove the pork and the rolls from the grill.

To assemble, spread mayo on the rolls, add a layer of pork, a layer of the pickled vegetables and the chopped cilantro. Not a fan of cilantro? Parsley will work as well. The hot debate on my house was the use to cheese slices. I opted to keep it simple!