Pork Loin for a Holiday meal

Planning special meals for Holiday times allowed me to expand our usual menus. Instead of planning the meal around whatever package of beef I pulled from the freezer, I actually stopped at the meat counter of the grocery store and bought meat! Beef is always a favorite at our house, and our loyalty will stay there, but having pork for holiday meals was a treat also.
Pork Loin Roast was one special meal. Pork is also a lucky food for New Year's Day, especially in the Midwest. The South can have their black-eyed peas, but here in the Midwest we're more likely to find pork and sauerkraut on our New Year's Day table.
The superstition that makes Pork a celebratory food is that because pigs root ahead as they feed, as opposed to chickens and turkeys, who move backwards as they scratch and eat. This is considered a symbol of progress and good luck for the new year. Also many of our ancestors came from Germany, where pork is a popular meat. Pork is often considered a winter food, dating from the times when farmers would slaughter the pigs they'd raised in the fall so they could do the time consuming butchering job during cold weather. Fresh cuts were used first, then the smoked and preserved hams and sausages followed.
Our dinner was Herb Crusted Pork Tenderloin. The tenderloin I purchased was a roast cut from a very large tenderloin. If you find smaller tenderloins than can be cut into medallions, that makes a nice presentation.

Herb Crusted Pork Tenderloin

Ingredients:
1 (4-pound) boneless pork loin with fat left on
1 tablespoon salt (or less)
2 tablespoons olive oil
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 teaspoon dried basil
1 teaspoon dried rosemary

Directions:
Preheat oven to 475 degrees. Place the pork loin on a rack in a roasting pan. Combine the remaining ingredients in a small bowl. With your fingers, massage the mixture into the pork loin, covering all of the meat and fat.
Roast the pork for 30 minutes, then reduce the heat to 425 degrees and roast for an additional hour. Test for doneness using an instant-read thermometer. When the internal temperature reaches 155 degrees, remove the roast from the oen. All it to sit for about 20 minutes before carving, it will continue to cook while it rests.