Juicy Baked Pork Chops in Tomato Sauce made with fresh tomatoes and passata, infused with aromatic herbs and warm allspice flavor. A humble and filling, true Greek family meal!

These easy, baked pork loin chops are a delicious weekday meal you can prepare with minimal effort. The sauce adds a great depth of flavor to the pork chops without the need to pan-fry or sear them first. You just slowly cook them straight into the sauce!
Table Of Contents
How To Make
To make tender baked pork chops in tomato sauce, first, you prepare the tomato sauce on the stovetop, then add it to a baking pan with the pork chops and bake covered (for juicy and tender pork chops). Lastly, finish off baking uncovered for a few minutes.

The sauce needs to be cooked and thickened before you add it to the pan with the pork chops. This is done for three reasons.
One is to give time to the fresh tomatoes and tomato passata (sauce) to release their sour flavor and become sweeter. The second is to create a uniform flavor where all the spices and herbs blend nicely together. And third is for the sauce to thicken.
The tomato sauce needs to thicken on the stovetop because pork chops will release water as they bake, so unless we're planning on making a soupy stew, it's best to thicken the sauce well first.

The final step to baking pork chops in sauce is to uncover the baking pan and cook for a few more minutes. This gives a deeper color to the sauce and a nice, thicker saucy coating to the pork chops.
Pork Chop Cuts
You can use any part of the pork loin chop you want. In Greece, there are two cuts of pork chops. One is pork loin neck chops (mprizoles lemou) and the second is pork shoulder chops (mprizoles spalas). The first is more tender because it contains more marbled fat and connective tissue, while the second is equally delicious, leaner, with the fat being mostly on the outer edge of the chop, and therefore, easier to turn dry.
Cooking pork loin chops in the oven, coated with sauce and covered, means the pork chops become soft and tender. You don't run the risk of overcooking them and turning them dry (unless you overbake uncovered on the last step).
Therefore, you can use any pork chop cut you want. You can even use boneless pork neck or pork shoulder cut into sliced pieces (2 cm - ¾-inch thick) and make this recipe!

How Long To Bake Pork Chops
For about 1 hour and 10 minutes overall. This means 45 minutes of baking them covered and about 20-25 minutes of final baking uncovered. The final baking depends on how quickly the sauce thickens, so it's give or take. Don't expect the sauce to thicken as well as it does on the stovetop, though.
It's a different cooking method, so the sauce at the bottom of the pan will stay a bit liquid while the sauce coating the pork chops with become thicker. Overall, the baked tomato sauce won't be as uniform as a sauce thickened on the stovetop.

Recipe Tips
- Leave pork chops at room temperature for 30 minutes before cooking them. This helps the meat to stay juicy and tender by avoiding sudden temperature shifts.
- If tomatoes are not in season and you make this recipe during wintertime, it's better to skip using fresh tomatoes for this recipe. Use a can of whole canned tomatoes (skipping fresh tomatoes and tomato passata in this case) and pulse them in a blender or food processor. This will yield a thick-textured sauce similar to that of the summer version.
Make Ahead
You can cook the tomato sauce up to 4 days ahead and store it in the fridge until you're ready to bake the pork chops.
Storing
You can keep baked pork chop leftovers in airtight food containers in the fridge for up to 4 days.
Reheating
Reheat either in the microwave, covered with plastic wrap, for about 5 minutes (for each pork chop) on high. Or in a baking dish in the oven, covered with foil, for about 20 minutes in a well-preheated oven at 180°C / 355°F.

Serve With
These oven-baked pork chops with tomato sauce are best served with some steamed rice, potato fries, or mashed potatoes. You can try them together with my Greek Oven Fries with Feta recipe, or Healthy Mashed Potatoes with Greek Yogurt for a heavenly-flavorful meal.
If you want to skip the carbs, serve with Baked Greek Vegetables (Briami) and a piece of feta cheese on the side.
Recipe

Oven Baked Pork Chops In Tomato Sauce
Equipment
- aluminum foil
Ingredients
- olive oil
- 4 pork chops (about 250-300 grams each) left at room temperature for 30 minutes
- 140 grams (1 medium-sized) onion minced
- 3 garlic cloves finely chopped
- 300 grams (3 medium-sized) Roma tomatoes finely diced
- Optional: ½ teaspoon sugar
- 250 grams (1 cup) tomato passata (tomato sauce)
- 375 ml (1½ cups) hot water or stock
- 2 teaspoons dried marjoram or oregano
- 1 teaspoon dried thyme
- 1 teaspoon ground coriander
- 1 bay leaf
- 4-5 allspice berries or ⅓ teaspoon ground allspice
- 2 tablespoons fresh parsley finely chopped
- coarse sea salt
- ground pepper
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 200°C / 390°F.
- Heat a splash of olive oil in a saute pan.
- Saute onion and garlic.
- Add the fresh chopped tomatoes and season with coarse sea salt. Cook over high heat until the tomatoes drain and start sticking to the pan.
- Add in the tomato passata, sugar (add if tomatoes aren't too sweet), marjoram (or oregano), thyme, coriander, allspice, bay leaf, and the hot water or stock. Season with ground pepper as well.
- Simmer for about 20 minutes over moderate heat until the sauce thickens. Meanwhile, prepare the pork chops.
- Beat each pork chop with a meat tenderizer. Then season each chop on both sides with coarse sea salt and ground pepper.
- Take the sauce off the heat and stir in the parsley.
- Spread half of the sauce and coat the bottom of a baking pan or dish, big enough to fit the pork chops.
- Add the pork chops on top and coat with the remaining sauce.
- Cover the pan with aluminum foil and bake for 45 minutes.
- Remove the aluminum foil and bake for another 20-25 minutes.
- Serve with fried potatoes or steamed rice on the side.





Delicious !!! Will keep in my BEST recipes file.
I tried this recipe and it was delicious. My family enjoyed it. I added some additional spices like cayenne, oregano and basil for an extra kick.
I was stuck for ideas for dinner so I did this for dinner tonight served with maccaroni, it was lovely nice tender cooked pork chops velvety tomato sauce. my wife cleared her plate which is almost unheard off
Delicious recipe & very easy. Chops stayed beautifully tender