Italian Meatballs

Last Friday was the office holiday party and due to so many budget cuts, there's no money in the department budget for going out or catering or much of anything at all. Kinda stinks, but we sucked it up and had an Italian potluck. The result was a real good lunch of antipasto, salad, fruit, lasagna, a most excellent cheesecake, and my contribution, meatballs in sauce. It's been a long time since I made Italian meatballs, so I went looking for recipe in my old cookbooks and I found this one for spaghetti and meatballs in my 1980 Betty Crocker International Cookbook. I didn't make the spaghetti, just the meatballs. They were good - no pictures, though, sorry. I'll post them next time. And there will be a next time.

Meatballs!
Ingredients:
1 1/2 pounds ground round
3/4 cups dry bread crumbs *(make your own)
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1/2 cup milk
1 egg
2 Tablespoons fresh grated Parmesan**
1 Tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/4 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper

* Make your won breadcrumbs - I toasted some 2 day old Italian bread, let it cool, then ran it through the food processor to make the bread crumbs.
**2 Tablespoons? Really? No. I added a little more, about a 1/2 cup.

Method:
1) Heat oven to 350.
2) Mix all of the ingredients together and use the very best mix mixer you've got, your hands!
3) Shape the mixture into 1 1/2 inch balls. (For easier shaping, dip your hands into cold water from time to time.)
4) Place on an ungreased jelly roll pan (I lined mine with heavy duty foil for easier cleanup).
5) Cook uncovered 15-20 minutes. (I "sacrificed" one to make sure they were done. Yummy.)

As for the sauce, well, I went easy and cheap. Once at work, I put the meatballs in a crockpot, and added a 26 oz can of Hunt's Garlic & Herb Spaghetti Sauce. I gave it a quick stir and let it sit in the crock on low from about 0900 until lunch at 1130.

Enjoy,
Lorence

Big Shot Buffalo Meatballs

A recent class project on prairie animals gave Boogie a hankering for buffalo. So a'huntin we went and wound up finding a pound of prey at Whole Foods. Boogie was on a mission - he had created his own recipe, gave it a name and was ready to cook.

Since he's still just a kid and kind of little, I supervised his use of the food processor (he made the bread crumbs fresh), the oven and the stove closely, but I pretty much let him loose to do his thing. He did very well handling the ingredients and tools, chopping the mushrooms, grating the cheese, measuring the herbs and spices (I did separate the egg for him, though), and even smooshing it all together and forming the balls.

The end result was well worth the effort and this dish will wind up in a regular rotation at our house.

Big Shot Buffalo Meatballs
An original Boogie recipe

Ingredients:
1 pound Ground Buffalo meat
1 Egg
1 Egg White
1/2 Cup grated Parrano cheese
1/2 cup fresh Bread Crumbs
1 teaspoon coarse sea salt
1 teaspoon fresh ground pepper
1 teaspoon Marjoram
2 portobella mushrooms, 1 chopped fine, 1 medium diced
1 jar Heinz Brown Gravy (12 ounce)
1/2 pound wide egg noodles

Method:
1) Preheat oven to 350F
2) Cut one mushroom int o a medium dice.
3) Put gravy into a small saucepan. Add medium diced mushrooms. Place on burner on simmer an partially cover. Be sure to stir the gravy occasionally.
4) Chop the other mushroom fine.
5) In a large bowl, mix the fine chopped mushrooms, cheese, bread crumbs, salt, pepper, marjoram, eggs, and meat. Blend well by mixing with your hands.
6) Line a baking sheet with foil. Spray the foil with vegetable cooking spray.
7) Form meatballs from the meat mixture that are about 1 to 1 1/2 inches around & place them on the baking sheet. Leave some space between each meatball.
8) Put the baking sheet in the oven and bake for about 20 minutes.
9) Prepare the egg noodles according to the package instructions. Drain them well when they're done.
10) Remove the meatballs from the oven.
11) In a clean large bowl, add the gravy to the noodles.
12) Serve by putting the noodles and gravy on a plate and topping them with several meatballs.

Enjoy,
Lorence