The secret to a terrific pork chop is a tasty brine. Like a marinade, a brine will uniformly infuse the chop with flavor — in this case, salt, garlic, pepper, Bay leaf and rosemary. It softens the meat, and helps it hold onto its juices throughout cooking. Here we’ve added brown sugar to the brine, too. On the grill, it caramelizes, giving the pork chop a lightly sweet, aromatic bark.

Okay, maybe there are two secrets: In order to get that caramelization, we grill the chop over high, direct heat for a handful of minutes. That sears all the juice into the chop too, and then you can finish it with a pat of butter and some thyme in the oven. The result is a beautiful, glossy brown pork chop that tastes wonderful — crispy at the edges, meat full of garlic and herbs and so moist and tender.

If that doesn’t convince you to make it, maybe this will: these pork chops prep in just 5 minutes, and cook in under 25 minutes. The brining happens overnight, so you could come home from work, throw the pork chops on the grill and have dinner on the table in no time at all. We’d serve them with a citrusy beet salad — and maybe a few slabs of garlic toast, since you’ve got the grill fired up.