Hot Honey Fried Pork Tenderloin Sandwich Recipe

Decadent and dangerously delicious, these hot honey fried pork tenderloin sandwiches are the sort of meal that, once you try it, you'll be thinking about for weeks. Each sandwich features a nice piece of pork tenderloin, pounded thin and coated in seasoned flour and panko breadcrumbs before hitting the fry pan. The resulting cutlet is deliciously crisp and well-seasoned, even before it lands on a bun with thinly sliced red onion, pickles, and a hefty drizzle of hot honey sauce made with butter, honey, and Louisiana-style hot sauce. A sandwich like that is truly hard to beat.

In this recipe, brought to us by developer A.J. Forget, we take a few steps away from what one might consider a truly traditional fried sandwich, and the results are truly magic. A sandwich featuring any sort of fried cutlet is bound to be a crowd-pleaser, but the delicate crisp of the panko breadcrumbs and the sweet, salty, zingy hot honey sauce take this sandwich to a whole new level.

This recipe is divided into a few parts. For the hot honey sauce, you will need Louisiana-style hot sauce, honey, and butter. For the pork, you need pork tenderloin, flour, salt, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, pepper, egg, panko, and vegetable oil (or other high-heat oil) for frying. Finally, to assemble the sandwiches, you will need buns, mayonnaise, red onion, and pickle slices. Once you've gathered these ingredients together, you are ready to start cooking.

Add the hot sauce, honey, and butter to a saucepan over low heat and stir until the butter melts and everything is combined. Set aside.

One by one, place the pork tenderloin pieces in a large plastic bag or between two sheets of plastic wrap and pound them to around ½-inch thickness.

Pour the flour onto a plate and stir in ½ teaspoon salt as well as the garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, and pepper.

Lay out two more plates, pouring the beaten egg onto one, and the panko breadcrumbs onto the other.

Dredge the pork in flour, then egg, then panko, ensuring even coverage on all sides. Repeat with all tenderloins, setting each aside on a plate once finished.

Add the oil to a large skillet over high heat and bring to 350 F.

Add the pork pieces to the oil one or two at a time and fry until golden brown, around 3 minutes on each side.

When the pork is done frying, remove it to a plate lined with paper towels to drain excess oil. Sprinkle the remaining salt on the pork as it comes out of the fryer.

Spread mayonnaise on both sides of the buns, placing a piece of tenderloin on top. Drizzle over the hot honey and top with pickles and sliced red onion. Serve immediately.

Fried foods are popular all over the world. From katsu to chicken Parmesan, we just can't get enough of crispy, breaded cutlets. This recipe is no different, the star is a thin cutlet of pork tenderloin, breaded with panko, and fried until crisp and golden brown. But when it comes to these beloved cutlets, there are many breading options available.

We went with panko breadcrumbs in this recipe because they are easy to find, easy to use, and give a delightful crunch. Panko breadcrumbs are Japanese in origin and renowned for their delicate texture. While they are perfect in this recipe, there are plenty of alternatives. Standard breadcrumbs will work just fine here. Any properly-breaded cutlet will have a nice crunch to it, but standard breadcrumbs tend to create a crust that is denser and slightly more oily. 

If you want to get creative with your breading, the world truly is your oyster. In fact, oyster crackers, saltines, and Ritz crackers are all popular breading choices. Just about any grain product, when dried and crushed, can be used to bread fried foods. Some interesting and notable breadcrumbs alternatives for frying include things like chip crumbs and even some breakfast cereals. When it comes to fried foods, there is plenty of room for experimentation and creativity.

The hot honey in this recipe is a simple combination of honey, butter, and hot sauce. It's quick and easy to throw together, perfect for slathering over a fried pork tenderloin to add a smidge of sweetness, a hint of heat, and a trace of tang. But with all of the hot sauce varieties on the market, which one is really the best for making hot honey?

In this recipe we stuck with a classic Louisiana-style hot sauce (popular brands of this style include Frank's Red Hot, Louisiana, and Crystal). Louisiana-style hot sauces are made using only cayenne peppers, salt, vinegar, and water, creating a sauce that's full of flavor but not too spicy, and one sporting a healthy acidity. That strong vinegar flavor is why we opted for Louisiana-style hot sauce in this recipe. Combined with butter and honey, you have a sauce with a nice balance of salt, sweet, spice, and zing. But there are lots of other options out there.

We would be remiss not to mention another of the most popular hot sauces, sriracha, as a potential substitute. Sriracha doesn't boast the same vinegar flavor, but the flavor of the chilis themselves is more pronounced, and it is already on the sweeter side for hot sauces. If you like that sweet chili flavor, sriracha would be a great alternative.