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Baked Moroccan Meatballs

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Baked Moroccan Meatballs

I was just about to post a recipe for rocket pesto when I discovered that I’d done that way back in 2011. No point in telling you the same thing twice – and (depressingly) my more recent photo was actually worse too!

Fortunately, my back log of photos suggests that I write instead about some baked Moroccan meatballs that we had for an easy dinner before the latest lot of hot weather invaded.

If you can start this a little ahead, it’s worth it: allowing the meatballs some time to sit in the fridge, firm up and develop flavours is time well spent. But, if you’re in a rush – no matter, you can have this dinner on the table quickly.

This recipe should make enough meatballs for four for dinner.

Begin by taking 500g of lean beef mince. Mix in half a red onion, finely chopped, and a generous 2 tsp of ras el-hanout. If you don’t have that to hand, use some ground coriander and cumin. Add salt, pepper and additional chilli (use chilli powder for this, rather than flakes) to taste. Because my ras el-hanout had chilli in it, I just stuck to salt and pepper.

Ensure the seasoning and onion is mixed thoroughly through the mince, form into walnut sized meatballs, place on a plate and refrigerate until you’re ready to cook.

Heat some olive oil in a pan (a pan you can put in the oven), and brown the meatballs all over. When they’re browned, remove them from the pan and set aside.

Now use the same pan to make your sauce. Add some extra oil and heat, then add 1 brown onion, finely chopped, a clove or two of minced garlic and chilli (fresh or flakes, again, to taste and totally optional). Add a tin of chopped tomatoes (buy Australian!) and half a tin of water. Cook gently until the sauce begins to thicken and add half a chopped capsicum.

Heat your oven to 180°C. Tuck the meatballs into the sauce (I found I didn’t have space for all of them) and place in the oven to finish cooking. Depending on how thick your tomato sauce is (or becomes) you may need to cover the pan with a lid (or tin foil) to stop it thickening too much.

When the meatballs are cooked and the sauce is thickened, serve, garnished with fresh coriander, and any appropriately North African sides (yep – we had couscous!).

We had a few leftover meatballs and a bit of leftover sauce, so the next day I put the meatballs in a pie dish, poured over the sauce, topped generously with grated cheese (we had some mozzarella left over from pizzas) and reheated in the oven. A great way to use up leftovers!

Pork Chops with Gremolata and Polenta

- Alex 2 Comments

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Pork recipes are always hugely popular on Eating Adelaide for some reason. The most popular in the last month has been this super easy one pan pork fillet recipe. Today, let’s look at a slightly cheaper cut: the pork chop.

This is not so much a recipe, because all you do is pan fry the pork chop, but it’s more some ideas of what to serve with your pork chop to jazz it up a bit. I always remove the rind from the chops before frying: in the pan they never get crisp and it’s better to remove them, let them dry out in the fridge for a couple of days and throw them on the grill on the weekend when you do your bacon. Delicious!

In this meal, inspired by Delicious (UK), you serve your chop with polenta and gremolata. I added buttered spinach too, for some greens, but a salad would work well and give you a bit more vegetable variety.

For 2 people we find 100g of (quick cook) polenta, cooked with 400g of water, just a little too much. I always have plans to do something with it the next day (polenta crisps, Roman gnocchi) but it just never happens. But the rule is, four times as much water as polenta. Boil the polenta up on the stove, stirring it and keeping the heat under control. If it gets too hot, you’ll have little geysers of polenta exploding out of the pan and if one hits you, you’ll know all about it! HOT!

Cook the polenta until it’s done: and done is when it’s a silky consistency and it no longer feels grainy or gritty. I’ve never yet managed to overcook polenta and, if you find it’s ready a bit soon, you can turn off the heat because it reheats beautifully.

If you watched My Kitchen Rules last night, you’ll have heard Pete Evans mention that polenta needs seasoning. He is not wrong. Don’t be shy with the salt. At a minimum I add grated parmesan and salted butter to my polenta (both to taste or according to how much is actually left in the fridge!). If you have cream, or better yet, mascarpone, add this for beautiful silky smooth polenta. Seasoning is even more critical in a dish like this, where you don’t really have any sauce for the polenta to soak up. Taste as you go, and season by feel.

Gremolata is easy: chop parsely and add finely minced garlic, some chilli flakes and some grated lemon rind. Be careful with the garlic – as it’s not cooked it can easily become overpowering and hot, which is not what you want.

Serve the polenta on hot plates, top with a pork chop and sprinkle with gremolata. Serve extra gremolata on the side, along with some vegetables.

You’ll be able to do the polenta in the time it takes the pork chops to cook, which makes this dish extremely quick – as well as tasty and a pleasant change to a plain pork chop with salad.

Oh – and I’d recommend not serving it in a bowl.  Because there’s no sauce you don’t have to worry about the polenta going sloppy and running everywhere and it can be tricky to cut a chop, and work your way around the bone, in a bowl!!!

Smoked Salmon with Soba Noodles and Ponzu

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We eat quite a lot of salmon in our household: the toddler enjoys tinned salmon (Tasmanian, of course) as a snack/lunch/easy dinner, we all love fresh salmon (especially the crispy skin!) and smoked salmon is popular too. One thing we miss, which we used to eat a lot of in England, is hot smoked fish. ‘Normal’ smoked salmon is cold smoked, so the fish is effectively not cooked (it is cured beforehand). Hot smoking uses hot smoke, so the fish is both cooked and preserved by the smoking process. While smoked salmon is normally sold finely sliced, hot smoked salmon is sold in steaks. If you don’t like smoked salmon, give hot smoked a go, because it’s very different.

Anyway, when I spotted this recipe, using both hot smoked salmon AND soba noodles, I had to give it a go. It has very few ingredients, but you might struggle to find the frozen edamame unless you go to a specialist Asian food store. Soba are pretty easy to find although the ones I bought from the supermarket were about 75% wheat and only 25% buckwheat. If you have the time and inclination, seek out a higher proportion of buckwheat.

Begin by making the ponzu sauce. To the juice of one lemon add 1 tbsp rice wine vinegar, 2 tbsp of soy sauce, ½ tsp caster sugar and 1 tsp of sesame oil. Mix to dissolve the sugar and set aside.

Take your hot smoked salmon (I used one 185g packet between the two of us) and, if the skin is still on, remove it. Straight from the packet it will be extremely tough and really quite unpleasant. You can always have a go frying it up if you wish! Flake the fish (equally!) into two bowls. Into each bowl add a finely sliced spring onion, some julienned carrot and some julienned cucumber. I used these in lieu of the edamame; I suggest you use whatever is in the fridge!

You could easily do all this in advance. At this point, cover your bowl(s) with cling film and pop in the fridge until you are ready. If you prefer the salmon at room temperature (like me) don’t forget to take them out half an hour or so before you want to eat.

When you’re ready to serve, cook some soba noodles in boiling water. Be careful not to overcook because they will become a bit soggy and claggy if you do. The ponzu will help separate the noodles and perk them up, but you’re much better off opting for al dente.

Top the salmon and vegetables with the soba, pour over the ponzu and sprinkle on a few sesame seeds (toasted if you can be bothered).

Not only does this taste really good, but it’s easy, quick and insanely healthy.

This alone did us for dinner (though we did wrap up the evening with a sneaky chocolate!). It would also serve well as a salad to serve as part of a more extravagant meal, or a light entrée. Aside from the salmon and noodles, it’s flexible and the ponzu is easily made from store cupboard ingredients. Andy did comment that he thought next time some finely sliced fresh chillis would be a welcome addition. If you do want to spice it up, you could also use chilli oil in lieu or (or as a part substitute for) the sesame oil.