Meatball Madness (II) Italian Style Meatballs in Tomato Sauce

Meatball madness! What? Again? You can't escape the madness! Especially when you have a lot of them hanging in your fridge, in wich case you can make them shine again with an easy and super delicious sauce. 

Now, the results of the original madness were some meatballs with a definite sweet touch, so I wanted to make a more sour sauce. 

Ingredients: 

the juice of 4 big, ripe, red tomatoes(just use a grater), 
1 medium onion, 
2 garlic cloves, 
200 ml of red wine, 
250 grams of tiny cherry and plum tomatoes, both red and yellow, 
half a handfull of basil leaves, 
salt and pepper

Saute the diced onion and garlic in some olive oil, add the wine and let the liquid reduce by half. Next put in the tomato juice and the tomatoes, chopped basil, salt, pepper and bring to a simmer on low heat, pop in the meatballs and cook with a lid on for about half an hour. a very simple but great tasting sauce that brings a wonderfull zing to the meatballs, so get your madness on and start cooking those meatballs.

Enjoy,

Meatballs Madness (I) Meatballs with Ricotta and Sun-dried Tomatoes

Did you ever think about who was the first person who thought of saying meatball madness? Who ever saw an indefinite amount of meatballs and screamed: This is madness! I keep imagining some 17th century dude, in his tight pants, being absolutely bedazzled by the sight of meatballs. So, with that image in mind, I decided I need to have  reason to say meatball madness, thereforeI had to cook some tasty  beef meatballs. 

I used: 

• 500 grams of minced beef, 
• 1 medium onion, finely diced, 
• 3 cloves of garlic, 
• 150 grams of ricotta cheese,  
• 100 grams of sun dried tomatoes and about 3 tbs of the oil they were kept in, 
• parsley,  
• thyme, 
• 2 eggs, 
• flour, 
• salt, 
• pepper, 
• some oil for cooking. 

Just mix all the ingredients together really well, except the flour. 

Make sure the onion, tomatoes, garlic and herbs are all finely chopped,  so you can mix then evenly.  Add the flour to thicken the composition, I used around 150 grams, both for putting it in the meat and for lightly flouring the meatballs. Heat up some olive oil on medium high heat, and fry you golf ball size meatballs until golden brown on all sides,  shouldn't take long. 

As a side dish, I just boiled some delicious,  fresh green beans and seasoned them as mentioned here. 

This meatball recipe, with  definite Italian influences is light, fresh and a delicious way to bring some ordinary and common meatballs to the next level. The ricotta make them moist and very light. There is definitely gonna be a next time cooking these.

Enjoy,

Ricotta and Tomatoes Puff Pastry Galette

Last night I was getting hungry and I just needed a quick snack. I remembered we have puff pastry in the freezer and I never get to use it.

I was in the mood for something rather salty, but ironically the only cheese we had was ricotta (not so salty).

I just rolled the puff pastry on a clean surface, dusted with some flour and divided the patsry in 6 equal squares. I sprinkled some salt on the dough, made some tiny holes with a fork, so that ot won't puff to much while baking. Then, I just added some ricotta cheese and thin slices of tomatoes in the middle leaving the edges clear. Brush the edges with a beaten egg and seal them so that the juices don't spill in the oven. Garnish it with some basil leaves and in the oven it goes.

After just 20-25 min you have a great snack and I have to say it is actually quite filling. I liked it best warm to room temperature, but cold would also do if you want to make smaller galettes and pack it for work/school.

Enjoy,