Adventures in Meatballs
Adventures in Meatballs
Meatballs; culinary inspiration from Stockholm & Amsterdam
Since we got married a few months ago, Mr H and I have celebrated our wedding with trips to Amsterdam and Stockholm. It’s been great; we’ve explored, taken a ton of pics, and eaten. Oh how we’ve eaten… Yum. Everything has been delicious, and we’ve particularly fallen in love with the meatballs.
In Stockholm we loved the creamy meatballs served with lingonberries and mashed potato, and in Amsterdam it was the rich, gravy and mash-filled Bitterballen that took our fancy.
Suffice to say, our travel experiences filled us with heaps of culinary inspiration; the sort that we took right home with us.
Although they’re inspired by our culinary adventures in Stockholm and Amsterdam, these are not Swedish or Dutch meatballs. Rather, they’re our way of remembering both places, with our very own meatball recipe.Today then, we’ll be making meatballs at home.
To be honest I doubt that Mr H or I could strictly stick to the same recipe – we’re constantly tossing this, that and the other in a pot, tasting as we go. It’s probably easier then to follow along our video…. But I’ve also put together some recipe and ingredient notes below.
Read more:
One Month Anniversary & A Chicken Pie
Ingredients
700g beef
300g lamb
1.5kg of tomatoes
1 garlic bulb
2 peppers
1 onion
1 chilli
Lemon zest
Half a lemon
50g rosemary
200g mushrooms
Tsp chilli powder
2 tb salt
1 tsp of black pepper
3 tsp ricota cheese
50g of parmesan
Panko bread crumbs
1tb of nutmeg
1tb paprika
Olive oil
1 can of plum tomatoe
salt
Egg yolk
Method
Meatballs:
• Mix the mince meat with the panko breadcrumbs, lemon zest, chilli, salt, egg yolk, chilli powder, paprika, and nutmeg. Mix until the mince is fine.
• Role the meat into balls and roll the balls one at a time into flour to hold shape.
• Shallow fry the meat balls until brown.
Sauce:
• Chop the tomatoes into halves and place in a baking tray, add rosemary and whole garlic bulb, 4 table spoons of olive oil, 1 table spoon of salt. Bake for 45min.
• Chop the pepper, onion and mushrooms
• Chop 3 garlic cloves
• Heat a large pot with oilve oil and add the chopped pepper, mushrooms, onion and garlic cloves. Saute for a few minutes then add the tomato can.
• Cut the chilli and grind in a mortar and pestle, then add the chilli to the simmering sauce.
• Take the.roasted tomatoes out of the oven and bash them to make tomatoe juice, add the garlic and some of the juices from the roasting pan, then pour this mixture into the simmering saucepan (above).
• Simmer the sauce for 10 minutes, and add a can-full of water.
• Add the meatballs, salt and chilli powder to taste and simmer for 25 mins.
• Finish off the sauce with 3 tea spoons of ricotta add 50g of parmesan. Mmm, creamy.
• Boil pasta and…
Enjoy!
