Hi all. Have not had much time to contribute to the forum lately, other than to quickly find something for dinner, but I was really pleased with this recipes by Justine Schofield, one of the original Masterchef contestants, that I got for Taste.com, that I thought I'd share. The comments on Taste.com indicate that people thought that it was a yummy, but time consuming meal to prepare, but I didn't find it a chore with Clancy (tmx) on board.
Ingredients (serves 4)
Meatballs
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 bacon rashers,
1 brown onion
2 thyme sprigs, leaves picked (didn't have any, so left out)
500g beef mince
250g veal mince
250g pork mince (I used 1/2 beef, 1/2 pork, you can mince in tmx if you like)
50g day old bread
2 tablespoons fresh ricotta
1 egg, lightly whisked
30g Parmesan
1/2 cup flat-leaf parsley leaves
2 garlic cloves
16 small bocconcini mozzarella (I used 8 boconccini, the size of a walnut in the shell)
Finely grated parmesan, extra, to serve
Basil leaves and crusty bread, to serve
Tomato sauce
2 tablespoon olive oil
1 brown onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 anchovy fillets in oil, drained, finely chopped
1 long red chilli, seeded, finely chopped (I used 1/2 a tsp of chilli flakes)
400g can chopped tomatoes
700ml btl tomato passata (sieved tomatoes)
(I added a heaped teaspoon of sugar)
1 dried bay leaf
Heat oven to 180.
Chop onion and bacon for a few seconds, speed 6. Scrape out and cook in the olive oil in a small frypan with thyme (if using) until onion is browned. (could do this in thermomix, but I find the bacon goes kind of watery). Allow to cool.
Meanwhile chop garlic and parsley, by dropping on to spinning blades through hole on top of lid, few seconds, speed 8. Scrape into large mixing bowl, no need to wash the tmx bowl, grate the cubed Parmesan, empty into mixing bowl, and make breadcrumbs, empty into mixing bowl.
Add the meats, the egg and ricotta into the large mixing bowl and mix ingredients together and season with salt and pepper.
Start to make sauce in tmx, chop onion and garlic and chilli, 5 seconds, speed 6. Add anchovies and olive oil, and cook varoma temp, speed 1, 5 minutes. Add passata and tomatoes, bayleaf and sugar if using. Cook 30 minutes, 100 deg, speed 1, with steaming basket on top, instead of measuring cup, to stop spattering. Taste and season if required.
While sauce is cooking, divide mixture into 8 and shape each piece into a tennis ball sized sphere. Pierce the ball and poke in a bocconcini, and carefully seal the meat around it. Place on lined tray (I cooked the meatballs in a Pyrex lasagne dish, so that I could just add the sauce later). Bake for 15-20 minutes.
Remove meatballs from oven and tip off any fat if desired (the pork mince I used was quite fatty). Cover with the tomato sauce and bake another 30-35 minutes (I turned the meatballs over a few times in the sauce while baking). Garnish with extra grated Parmesan, basil leaves and serve with crusty bread (I made Isi's extraordinary "ordinary" bread)
We thought these were delicious and filling. Serve them very hot so the cheese is stretchy rather than rubbery. I only took a picture of the uncooked meatballs, and can't figure out how to upload from ipad, but the finished product looks exactly the same as on Taste.com (yah!) I hope others enjoy too.
http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/28911/giant+meatballs+stuffed+with+mozzarellamembers' commentsmaddy - 1 meatball was enough!, very filling. Enjoyed but thought the sauce was a little lacking, so added a little more sugar and pizza topper herbs to it. I think meatballs/meatloaf do fare better texture wise, by mixing by hand, not by TM....just my opinion.I did add marinated feta instead of ricotta and used only 1/4 tsp. dried flaked chili in the sauce....enough heat for us.
jakodai - it was beautiful! I don't add the ricotta because I didn't like the smell of it.I took a shortcut and added the meatballs to the sauce when I first started cooking it, so the fat from the meatballs went into the sauce which meant it wasn't really usable to pour over the meatballs when serving which would have been very nice. I will definitely be making this again!
Hally - These are delish. Did change them slightly, 500g pork & 500g beef minced. Used fetta instead of ricotta as I had fetta.
Meatballs absolutely yum but they are huge, 1 for me, 2 for dh & cp (cp not quite finished no.2) dh & I had crusty bread, cp had rice.
I cheated on the sauce, used Leggos (as had in my cupboard) & added herbs from the garden. Still very nice then baked in oven with slices of parmesan cheese on top. Result, yes loved by all. OK Went back for 2nds, 30 mins later
cookie - made only a half mix and made 4 large meatballs. We had one each and the freezer got the other. We loved it and will definitely make it lots more times.
