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Peanut Noodles with Roasted Pork Tenderloin + Honeyed Oranges

Oven-roasted pork tenderloin cooks quickly and is delicious shredded and served over peanut noodles with honeyed oranges and fresh herbs.

Peanut noodles with shredded pork, fresh herbs, and honeyed oranges.

I’ve been making this meal for yeeeeears. It’s based on a roast pork and almond noodle recipe from Cooking Light.

Pork tenderloin is such a versatile ingredient! Some of our very favorite recipes utilize it, like this balsamic marinated pork tenderloin, this pan-roasted pork tenderloin with balsamic tomatoes, and this breaded pork tenderloin with lemon caper sauce.

In this dish, the pork tenderloin is roasted in the oven, then shredded and served over fettuccine with a delicious peanut sauce. My whole family loves this meal, and I hope you will too!

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🧡 Why we love this recipe

  • Pork tenderloin cooks quickly, making it perfect for busy weeknights.
  • The contrast of the warm pork and noodles with the cool, spiced oranges is so nice!
  • It’s colorful and delicious.
  • You just can’t go wrong with peanut sauce!

Ingredients laid out to make peanut noodles with pork tenderloin and honeyed oranges.


📝 Ingredients

Here’s everything you need to make this recipe for peanut noodles with roasted pork tenderloin and honeyed oranges (see recipe card below for ingredient amounts and full directions):

Sprinkling salt onto 2 pieces of pork tenderloin.
Checking the internal temperature of pork tenderloin with an instant-read thermometer.
Fork shredding pork tenderloin on a sheet pan.

🐖 Ingredient Spotlight: Pork Tenderloin

This recipe uses pork tenderloin which can be found in your grocery store located in the meat department.

Pork tenderloin is an incredibly versatile ingredient. It cooks quickly and can be prepared in a variety of ways.

Some of our favorite cooking methods for pork tenderloin include roasting, grilling, breading and frying, pan-searing (then transferring to the oven to roast and cook through), and sous vide cooking (then finishing it off by searing it in a hot skillet or on the grill).

Note that pork tenderloin is a different cut of meat than pork loin. You can read more about the difference between pork tenderloin and pork loin over on this post on allrecipes.

Pork tenderloin is most often sold in a package that has 2 pieces of pork tenderloin wrapped up together. Typically each piece of pork tenderloin weighs roughly 1 pound, so the packages are usually 2-ish pounds in total.

Depending on how you plan to use it, you may want to opt for one that’s been already marinated. Most grocery stores sell a variety of flavors of pre-marinated pork tenderloin.

Be sure that if you’re using pork tenderloin in a recipe like the one on this page you get one that’s not already in a marinade. (If you’re looking for a fantastic marinated pork tenderloin recipe, my balsamic marinated pork tenderloin has been a longtime favorite).

Personal temperature and texture preferences vary, but the FDA recommends cooking pork to at least 145°F.

Pork tenderloin is juicy and delicious when it’s still a little pink inside.

I know, that whole, “pork – the other white meat” campaign from the ’80s made it confusing to think of pork as something that is OK to serve at a variety of temperatures.

But much like steak, the flavor and texture are best when it’s not completely cooked through. It can help to think of pork more like beef than poultry.

Some of our favorite pork tenderloin recipes are:

Pouring reserved pasta water into a bowl of peanut butter.
Thin the peanut butter out with reserved pasta water.
Adding chili garlic sauce to a bowl of peanut sauce ingredients.
Add soy sauce, rice vinegar, ginger, and chili garlic sauce.
Whisking together peanut sauce ingredients in a bowl.
Whisk peanut sauce ingredients together to combine.

✅ How to make this recipe

This recipe has a few components – the pork, the noodles, the sauce, and the honeyed oranges. They all come together beautifully with a few steps.

  1. Preheat your oven to 425°F and bring a large pot of water to a boil.
  2. Slice each piece of pork tenderloin in half crosswise. Rub with oil and season with grill seasoning (or salt and pepper).
  3. Roast pork for 20 minutes, flipping halfway through. Transfer to a cutting board and let rest.
  4. Cook pasta according to package directions for al dente. Reserve 1/2 cup of the pasta water before draining.
  5. Whisk peanut sauce ingredients together in a bowl, using the reserved pasta water to thin it out. Toss 1/3 of the sauce with the cooked pasta.
  6. Cut oranges into segments and toss them in a bowl with honey and ground allspice.
  7. Shred pork tenderloin and serve on top of the fettuccine with additional peanut sauce, green onions, and mint.
  8. Serve with honeyed oranges alongside.

See recipe card below for full instructions.

Oranges on a cutting board with a knife and a bowl.
Cut both ends off of your oranges, then slice off the peel and pith.
Knife removing segments from an orange.
Cut the orange segments by running your knife between the membranes.
Squeezing an orange over a bowl.
Squeeze any juice left in the membranes into a bowl to make the sauce.

📌 Tips

When preparing the oranges, use your knife to cut supremes of fruit from between the membranes, letting them fall onto the cutting board. Squeeze the juice from the membranes over a bowl.

If the honey won’t incorporate into the orange juice easily with your whisk, you can microwave the bowl for a few seconds to help it loosen up.

Drizzling honey into a bowl of orange juice.
Add honey to the bowl of orange juice.
Whisking orange juice with allspice an honey in a bowl.
Whisk together with ground allspice.
Stirring orange segments in a bowl of spiced honey.
Gently stir in the oranges to combine.

I often take some of the juice from the bowl of honeyed oranges and drizzle it over my pork and noodles, too. It brightens it up and tastes great together.

🥣 Substitutions

The original version of this recipe was made with almond butter. Any nut butter that you enjoy will work here, including a nut-free substitute like Sunbutter.

If you can’t find fettuccine feel free to use linguine or spaghetti as a substitute. I think this recipe works best with “long noodles”, but you could use your favorite pasta shape here.

For the oranges, if you don’t have honey, you could substitute maple syrup or agave syrup. If using agave, start with half the amount and add more if needed.

2 bowls of pork and peanut noodles with oranges.
Fork twirling peanut noodles served with pork tenderloin and oranges.

🔪 Equipment

Most of what you need to make this recipe is fairly standard, but there are a few optional tools things that will make cooking this recipe go more smoothly.

🥡 Storage recommendations

Store any leftovers from this recipe in airtight containers in the refrigerator.

When dividing up your leftovers, I recommend storing the hot and chilled ingredients separately. I’ll often portion out individual servings so they’re easy to reheat, and can be enjoyed right out of that dish.

So one container will have some noodles, pork, and peanut sauce, then another container will have oranges. I find that the green onions and mint hold up best stored separately also, that way you can sprinkle them on top after the pork and noodles are reheated.

When reheating, I like to add a splash of water to the container with the pork and noodles. This helps keep them from drying out in the microwave. Give them a good stir after they’ve reheated.


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Peanut noodles with shredded pork, fresh herbs, and honeyed oranges.

Peanut Noodles with Roasted Pork Tenderloin + Honeyed Oranges

  • Author: Big Flavors from a Tiny Kitchen – Ashley Covelli (adapted from Cooking Light)
  • Prep Time: 15 Minutes
  • Cook Time: 20 Minutes
  • Total Time: 35 minutes
  • Yield: 46 Servings 1x
  • Category: Main Dish
  • Method: Stovetop, Oven
  • Cuisine: Asian

Description

Oven-roasted pork tenderloin cooks quickly and is delicious shredded and served over peanut noodles with honeyed oranges and fresh herbs.


Ingredients

Units Scale
  • 1 tablespoon peanut oil (or other high-heat cooking oil, such as avocado or grapeseed)
  • 2 pieces pork tenderloin (about 2 pounds total)
  • 3/4 teaspoon grill seasoning (or 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt and 1/4 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper)
  • Kosher salt, for the pasta water
  • 1 pound dried fettuccine

For the sauce:

For the honeyed oranges:

For serving:

  • 4 green onions, thinly sliced (about 1/2 cup)
  • 1/2 cup finely chopped fresh mint


Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 425°. Bring a large pot of water to a boil over high heat.

  2. For the pork: Slice each piece of pork in half crosswise, then rub with 1 tablespoon of oil. Sprinkle the pork evenly with 3/4 teaspoon grill seasoning (or 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt and 1/4 teaspoon black pepper), then place on a rimmed baking sheet.

  3. Transfer the baking sheet to the preheated oven for 10 minutes. Flip pork over and bake for an additional 10 minutes, or until a thermometer inserted into the center of the pork registers 155°F. Transfer the pieces of pork to a cutting board and let stand 10 minutes before shredding into small pieces with a fork.

  4. Meanwhile, once the water comes to a rolling boil, add 1-2 tablespoons of kosher salt, then drop the fettuccine in and cook according to the package directions for al dente. Reserve 1/2 cup of the pasta water, then drain the pasta and set aside.

  5. For the sauce: In a medium bowl, whisk together the reserved pasta water, peanut butter, soy sauce, rice vinegar, ginger, and chili garlic sauce. Taste for seasoning and add salt if needed. Toss 1/3 cup of the sauce with the cooked pasta to coat.

  6. For the honeyed oranges: Peel and section 4 large oranges over a medium bowl, squeezing the excess juice into the bowl. Whisk together the juice,1 tablespoon of honey, and 1/8 teaspoon ground allspice. Add the orange sections to the bowl and toss to coat.

  7. To serve, divide pasta evenly among 4 shallow bowls or plates. Top with the remaining sauce, shredded pork, honeyed oranges (with as much of the juice as you’d like), green onions, and mint.



Notes

Adapted from Cooking Light.

Nutrition

  • Serving Size: About 1 1/3 cups pasta topped with 1/6th of the pork, sauce, and oranges
  • Calories: 839
  • Sugar: 22.1 g
  • Sodium: 637.3 mg
  • Fat: 31.2 g
  • Saturated Fat: 6.9 g
  • Carbohydrates: 90 g
  • Fiber: 8.9 g
  • Protein: 54 g
  • Cholesterol: 98.2 mg

Keywords: pork tenderloin, peanut sauce, noodle recipe

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Ashley Covelli is a food photographer, recipe developer, and culinary instructor based in Ossining, New York. She loves helping people become enthusiastic and adventurous in the kitchen so that they can build skills and confidence to cook for themselves and their loved ones. She can almost always be found with at least 3 different beverages within arm's reach.

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