Easy Pork Schnitzel

🇩🇪 What makes this recipe special?

Schnitzel is both a dish and a cooking technique in which a piece of meat is pounded thin, coated with breadcrumbs, and fried. Often, this could include cuts of meat that are a bit more on the tough side, and tenderizing it helps turn it into something easier on the teeth. Once tenderized, it is covered in breadcrumbs and then fried to perfection.

There are different kinds of schnitzel, but we are making a schnitzel today using pork chops. Many people might associate schnitzel with the traditional Wiener Schnitzel.

Traditional Wiener Schnitzel is made with veal rather than pork. Wiener means ‘Viennese,’ so Wiener Schnitzel is a traditional Viennese preparation. 

Our recipe using pork and not veal is more accessible to your average home cook, affordable, and it tastes great. Once you have this technique down, you might consider trying it with other cuts of meat and you can confidently know you are making a schnitzel of some sort.

Consider making German Spaetzle, German Potato Salad, or some cheesy mashed potatoes as a side dish. No matter what you make, make sure to treat yourself!

🍖 Ingredients

Pork chops are the star of this recipe, but it takes a bit more to make this what it is. Here are the ingredients you will need:

• Boneless pork chop cutlets
• Whole milk
• All-purpose flour
• Eggs
• Bread crumbs
• Oil for frying 

See the recipe card for quantities.

Type Of Bread Crumbs to Use

Use what you like! I have a great homemade bread crumb recipe that can be used, but sometimes I even like simplicity and buy my breadcrumbs. For this recipe, I used Progresso Italian Breadcrumbs, as I usually have that in our cupboard. We have used it in other recipes like my Spicy Italian Meatloaf Recipe.

🍲 Instructions

One of the critical steps in making schnitzel is producing a thin cutlet of meat, and fat stands in the way. So, even though we are already using boneless pork chops, we need to make our ability to pound the meat as seamless as possible. 

So, trim the fat. If you leave the fat on the cut, it will be liable to cause a mess. The pork chop will be more difficult to pound out and more apt to fall apart around the fat. 

Our goal is to get it thin. About a quarter-inch thin. 

Use a Meat Tenderizer

You know the hammer-looking thing in your drawer of random kitchen stuff that is usually stuffed somewhere in the back? It probably gets caught when you open and close the drawer and makes you wonder why you have so much stuff stuffed in there?

Well, today, you put it to use. Usually, this tenderizer has a side with spikes and a flat side. Use the flat side. If you don’t have a meat tenderizer, now is as good as any time to pick one up! [Affiliate Link] You, too, can experience the joy of having a meat hammer catch on your kitchen drawer.

Place plastic wrap on each side of the pork chop before you start pounding. This helps reduce the mess but also helps keep the meat together when you are pounding. If you directly pound the meat without plastic wrap, there is just more of a chance that the meat will fall apart once you get on the thin side of things.

This really is not that long of a process and does not require the patience of a middle-school band teacher, but don’t rush this. It takes a little time to flatten the pork chop, and if you start whacking the meat in a frenzy of chaos, the end product might reflect that. Just slow your roll and beat your chop at an appropriate pace.

Dipping And Breading Your Schnitzel

You pounded out your pork and now we need to bread it. This is a simple four-step process. First, dip it in milk. Then, dip it in flour. Then, dip it in an egg wash. Finally, coat it in breadcrumbs. While it is four steps, it is easy! Each step helps ensure that the final product is as good as possible, so don’t skip any.

In a pinch, you can dip the pork in water instead of milk for the first step.

Set Up a Breading Station

Do yourself a favor and set up a breading station. Set out four containers, one for each of the breading ingredients. This will make the process super easy and help ensure you have some beautifully breaded schnitzels. We used a similar, though slightly different, breading process when we made our Baked Shrimp Po’ Boy recipe and our Beer Battered Fish Tacos recipe.

Frying Instructions

When you fry the schnitzel, you want it to be able to swim in the oil. This recipe uses shallow frying rather than a deep fryer, but the same hot-oil safety precautions apply, so use frying safety guidelines to ensure you can make this tasty meal safely. 

I use my smaller cast iron skillet to fry my schnitzel. Because these cook so quickly and they need a bit of time to drain, I feel good about cooking them one at a time, which works well with my smaller cast iron pan. 

I have a few tips to help make this as easy as possible. Make sure your oil is hot enough. I temp mine at 350° Fahrenheit before adding the pork and allow a little time between each cutlet for the oil to heat back up. Fry one cutlet at a time, or in batches that do not overcrowd the skillet, allowing the oil to return to 350°F between batches.

Also, have oil-safe tongs and a spatula nearby to help you navigate any issues you may encounter. The pork only needs to reach an internal temperature of 145°F, followed by a 3-minute rest, so a quick 45-second fry on each side is all I need. The tongs should allow you to flip them, but it can be nice to have a good spatula available just in case you need a bit more control over the cut.

As I said, you need to get to 145°F, followed by a rest of at least 3 minutes. While the 1 minute and 30 seconds of frying should get you there, I always recommend having a meat thermometer [AFFILIATE LINK] on hand to temp your meat. I want you to be safe, and using a thermometer makes it easy to confirm your food has reached the proper temperature.

❓ What To Serve With Schnitzel

With the schnitzel itself, we are just going with a traditional combination of parsley and lemon. That is all one really needs, but you might also try using this condensed mushroom soup recipe as the base for a quick mushroom gravy. 

Other than what is served directly on top of the cut, consider some potatoes, bread, or something that goes well with fried food. I have eaten this with baked potatoes, and I think this is a great pairing. Mashed potatoes would also go well, particularly if you are making gravy to go along with this.

🤷 Substitutions and variations

There are definitely a few ways to change this up.

• Breadcrumbs – I used Progresso Italian Breadcrumbs with this recipe. That said, use what you have! 
• Gravy or sauce – The recipe calls for just a sprinkle of lemon. That said, a gravy, such as this mushroom soup, would work great for a dish like this. 
• Oil – I like to use sunflower oil if I can, but canola or vegetable oil works well for deep frying. 

📦 Storage

Store leftover schnitzel in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3 to 4 days. It is best served right after frying. 

For the best texture, reheat in a skillet, air fryer, or oven until heated through and crisp.

🎓 History tidbit

The exact origins of schnitzel are a little murky, but breaded meats have a long history in Europe. One story connects the golden breading to wealthy diners in Renaissance Italy, who sometimes decorated food with gold leaf. When gilding food fell out of favor, golden breadcrumbs may have offered a similar look.

Many people are familiar with the word Wiener Schnitzel, which is NOT what we are making here today, but worth mentioning. Literally, this translates to Viennese Schnitzel or a schnitzel made in the style that people from Vienna do, or with veal. 

Documented references to Wiener Schnitzel appear by the early 1800s, although breaded cutlets have a much longer history. We, however, are using pork chops rather than veal, so this is a pork schnitzel rather than traditional Wiener Schnitzel. 

The story of schnitzel does not end in Europe though, as many Germans emigrated to America in the 1800s and 1900s. In the American South, you start to see beef recipes that closely resemble schnitzel appear. Chicken-fried steak and country-fried steak are often linked to schnitzel-style cooking brought by German and Austrian immigrants who settled in the South.

❓ FAQ

🛠 Products used in this recipe

• Meat Thermometer
• Meat Tenderizer
• Cast Iron Skillet
• Plastic Wrap
• Paper Towels
• Progresso Italian Breadcrumbs

😋 Did you make this recipe?

That is awesome, and thank you so much for giving this Easy Pork Schnitzel recipe a try. If you could leave a rating in the comment area below, it would be greatly appreciated. This lets me know how I am doing and also helps others decide if they want to make this recipe. Most of all, thanks for visiting Ramshackle Pantry.