Meatball Recipe

As some of you may know, I lived in the ECCO house, environmentally conscious and community oriented house, for my last two years of college. In the spring semester of 2012, Alex and Teddy decided to try out the Paleo diet. The boys bought a huge freezer. It was so huge that you could probably fit two humans in it! Then they bought 1/4 of a cow from Wheel-View Farm to eat for the semester. Since they were unable to finish the cow between the two of them, and Benner and I were the only two staying in the area for the summer, they gave us the rest of the beef.  WOHOO! Well, my new mission is to slowly work through this beef, mostly ground beef mind you, by the end of the summer. I've already cheated by giving some of it to other friends and co-workers, but yeah, it's still a ton of beef.

For this meatball recipe, you can really use any type of ground meat you want. When I'm home, I usually go through my parents freezer and take all the weird quantities of frozen meat (one pork chop here, a ground beef package there, etc), grind it up, and use that. This summer, we're have 100% beef meatballs because, well that's the meat we have!

These meatballs can be sauteed or baked: see directions below.





Ingredients:

2 pounds of ground beef (Wheel-View Farm)
3/4 wine (red or white, again use what you have open)
1/2 cup Pecorino Romano cheese, grated
2 slices of thick, stale bread, ground up in a food processor
1/2 cup parsley, washed and chopped in a food processor (Dzen Farm)
3 large garlic cloves, chopped in a food processor
1 egg yolk (Casey Farm)
1/4 non fat milk (Organic Valley)
Salt and pepper to taste


Directions:

1) PREHEAT OVEN TO 380F.

2) Pour the wine over the beef and mix together. Let sit for 10 minutes.

3) In a separate bowl, mix together pecorino, bread, parsley, and garlic. This mixture should create two cups.

4) Add the cheese, bread, and herb mix to the beef. Add in the egg yolk, milk, a dash of salt and pepper to taste. Mix as little as possible. Stop mixing the second everything looks evenly dispersed.

5) TO BAKE: Grease a baking pan or cookie sheet with olive oil. Begin making small meatballs, about 1 inch in diameter. Place the meatballs on the baking sheet so that none of the meatballs are touching. Cook for 15 minutes. Cut one open to make sure it's not pink inside. If it's not pink, then it's done. When finished place them on a paper bag or paper towel to absorb the excess oil.

6) TO COOK WITH OIL: Heat 1 inch of cooking oil (light olive oil or vegetable oil) in a sautée pan. Put your hand over the pan (don't touch it, duh); if you can feel the heat, add the meatballs to the pan so that they are not touching. Cook for five minutes. Turn over each meatball so that it cooks evenly through. Cook for another three minutes. Cut one open and make sure there is no pink on the inside. When finished place them on a paper bag or paper towel to absorb the excess oil.

7) Serve with pasta and your favorite tomato sauce recipe. I'll upload my mom's one day.

Advice on sautéing vs. baking: When I first started making meatballs, I always cooked them in oil. I thought it would give the exterior a better looking texture. However, sautéing meatballs takes a long time because you usually have to do them in batches. If you are impatient like me, you can also make the mistake of trying to turn them over before they're ready, and then they can fall apart, which is a mess. They also are much oily-er, which you'll see on the paper bag.

This time I baked them and, honestly, they had the same flavor as when I sautéed them. Baking them also kept their structure in tact more. The meatballs were definitely less oily. While they didn't have as nice of "perfectly browned exterior", by the time they were covered in sauce, I did not notice the difference. It was also nice to walk away from them and get the pasta cooking/ do some dishes instead of constantly tending to the meatballs in the oil.

Winner: Bake