Meat Ball Mezza

I know spaghetti is what most people think of when someone says meat balls, but not me.

Me, I think mezze. (what did you think I was going to say??) It's basically just a bunch of finger foods eaten as a meal. I love finger foods and small plates. Mezze is along the lines of tapas, which seems to be the trendy Spanish version. This is a more Mediterranean thing, like with hummus and pita... and hey! We already know how to make those!

Mediterranean Meaty Balls in Tomato Sauce

What you need:

• ½ lb lean ground beef
• 1 c rice
• 1 egg
• ¼ c parsley
• 1 tbsp mint
• 2 tbsp dill
• ½ onion
• 2 cloves garlic
• ½ tsp cumin
• ½ tsp coriander
• ¼ tsp cayenne
• ½ c grated parmesan or romano cheese
• 1 tin of diced tomatoes
• ¼ c flour
• 1 tbsp butter

Yeah, yeah, I know, I missed a few things in the pic. I hope you know what butter looks like.

What you gotta do:

Chop the mint, onion, garlic, and dill.

Put half of the mint, onion, garlic, and dill, along with half of the cayenne, cumin and coriander in a bowl with the meat, egg and rice.

Grate the cheese and add it to the meaty bowl too. Okay, that's a pretty picture but a much too small bowl. Make sure your bowl is big enough or you're going to have to wash two.

Mix and mash this all together by hand.

In a shallow pan, heat a bit of olive oil.

Add the other half of the mint, onion, garlic, and dill, along with half of the cayenne, cumin and coriander to the pan and sautee for a minute.

Um, okay, yes, those ingredients are already in meaty balls. The space time continuum does not apply to this blog.

Add the tomatoes. I really recommend using the diced, rather than crushed. You get a bit of texture in the chunks, and a thinner, lighter “sauce” in which to poach the meaty balls. I imagine you’re looking at the volume and thinking there’s no way that’s enough sauce for your spaghetti. It’s not. This isn’t sauce for spaghetti. It’s sauce for meaty balls.

Put the flour into a shallow bowl or plate. Roll the meat/rice mixture into balls about 1 inch in diameter. You should get between 20 and 24 of them. Not bad for only half a pound of meat. This is a very budget friendly dish.

Drop them into the flour

and roll them around to coat them with the flour. You’re going to get sticky and messy here. I recommend having one hand as your flour hand, and one as your meaty ball hand.

Once they’re fully coated, gently shake off any excess, then drop them into the simmering tomatoes. Don’t worry if a bit of flour gets into the sauce, it’s supposed to. It’s there to thicken things up.

Add a tbsp or two of butter to the sauce around the same time as you're adding the meaty balls.

Once they’re all in and cozy, cover them and let them cook for about 10 minutes.

Gently roll them over and then cover and cook for another 10-15 minutes. Shaking the pan back and forth a bit may be enough to roll them over, but if it's not, be careful. These are tender meaty balls. Ticklish even.

If you don't feel up to doing a mezze meal, these are great with a side of rice (season it Greek style with olive oil, lemon juice, and mint in the water!) or roasted potatoes, and a salad.

If you do feel like mezza, serve them on a shallow plate nestled in their sauce.

Besides the hummus and pita, I think pickled things are an absolute requirement. And not just olives! Go for the pickled beans, aparagus, carrots, onions, cucumbers even! A bit of tiropita (like spanikopita but without the spinach, cheese only!) is handy. But don't forget the tzaziki to dip!

What's your favourite pickled vegetable??

Getting it out of my system

Last peanut butter recipe for a while, I promise. Unless Taneasha makes jelly, then all bets are off.

I get regular requests for peanut butter cookies and for oatmeal cookies, and I finally decided to give in and make the boys what they want. Now, I’m not a fan of either, but they are popular cookies so I guess most people don’t mind having things that belong at breakfast for dessert.

And even though it’s cooled off a bit lately, I have been thinking lots about the no bake sort of cookie. My mom used to make something that she called “macaroons” as her usual no bake treat. I’ve since learned that this is a Canadian name for what most people call Haystacks, and what other people call macaroons are not what I call macaroons, though both contain coconut.

Anyway.

I decided to kill two birds with one stone, and save myself having to make one or the other at a later date. Less painful for me, and the boys at work get what they want. Happiness abounds.

No Bake Peanut Butter Cookies

What you need:

• 2 c sugar
• ¾ c milk
• ¾ c butter
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 ½ c peanut butter
• 3 c quick cooking oats
• 1 ½ c rice crispies (gotta love the individual serving size... too bad my kid doesn't)

What you gotta do:

So, I used the Teddy Bear peanut butter (and I can almost see Taneasha cringing at seeing it again) which is a fairly sweet one. If you use an all natural, peanuts only one, you might want to increase your sugar a bit, maybe to 2 ½ cups.

In a good sized pot (bigger than you think you’ll need) combine the sugar, milk and butter over medium heat.

While that heats, measure out your peanut butter into a large metal or glass bowl. Something heatproof.

Keep an eye on your pot o’ milk. This will boil eventually, even on medium. Stir it as it’s heating though, you don’t want it stuck to the bottom of the pan.

Mine looked a little bit curdle-y just as it was starting to boil,

but that disappeared once the boil was good and rolling. And by rolling, I mean it won’t stop or fall if you stir it.

When it gets to that point, just set the spoon aside and set your timer for 2 minutes.

It will rise up a bit as it boils. This is why you need a bigger than you think you need pot. You really really don’t want this boiling over onto your stove.

This is the beginnings of a creamy caramel. Butter, milk and sugar. Freaking tasty.

After your two minutes are up, slowly pour the almost caramel over the peanut butter

And add a dribble of vanilla. Yes, I know I seem to have reverted to just eyeballing ingredient amounts. At least I gave you a volume in the ingredient list. Feel free to actually measure, if you want to.

Once again, stirring stuff into peanut butter looks weird at first,

But eventually it all comes together.

Dump in your oats and cereal.

And start stirring.

I left out the third cup of oats and started with 2 cups of oats and all the cereal; it’s better to have to add dry ingredients than to try to figure out how to hydrate a dry cookie batter (Is this batter? Dough? What exactly is in my bowl??)

Eventually though, I did add the last cup.

That brought the consistency to something I was confident would hold some kind of shape if I dropped it by blobs onto paper.

If you’re not sure of yours, drop a spoonful onto paper. It should mostly hold its shape and not spread too much.

If it’s good, keep blobbing.

And blobbing.

And then add more paper at the end so you can get the last of the blobs out of the bowl.

Build yourself a rag tag army of blobs.

69 of them in fact. Don't believe me? Count 'em.

They need a bit of time to set. And fridging them will definitely help with that process. Just make sure you don’t put them all on one big sheet of parchment if you think you may need to relocate them.

These are gooey and sticky and caramelly in texture, and since they contain peanut butter, oatmeal, milk, and rice crispies, they make for a perfect breakfast cookie.

What's your favourite breakfast cookie??