Swedish Meatballs

Oh gads, that sounds good. Purist that I am I'd add real parsley, and my own roux with mushrooms, but hey, it sounds great.

I also seem to remember making Danish meat balls some long time ago. Have to go googleing.

Oh, wait, lemme see what Craig Claiborne has to say about all of these, Swedish, German, Danish. Not that he's the last word, but I'm fond of his old international cookbook.

Oh, great, another typing extravaganza..
he's got three Swedish Meatball recipes, whew, no Danish ones (and anyway, I may remember that wrong, except I think I had them in Solvang, so maybe they do exist), and doesn't mention German ones. Uh oh, Norwegian, Sicilian...Armenian.. Indian.. STOP.

OK, on with the Swedish:

Oh, no... they all look similar. Variations on some of the ingredients and methods, and I'm no good at making charts. One has nutmeg, two don't, all use allspice. All use a meat grinder; two use pork, beef, and veal, one uses pork and beef with veal an option. All put it through a grinder 4 times.

Ah, never mind.

On looking up Craig Claiborne and swedish meat balls on google, I didn't find a link that had all three recipes, but did find this fascinating blog, which presumably has swedish meat balls in it, but I've lost interest and am off to potato dumplings..

http://www.4swedishrecipes.blogspot.com/

Ok, I scrolled down on that blog and did find swedish meatballs and veal meatballs (cream of mushroom soup mentioned).

oh yum.that is a great blog.
Thanks for that!

Watch out for food blogs! In my browser's bookmark bar I have a heading for Flogs (to distinguish them from other blogs). That opens to... 46 food blogs, which are a mere drop in the bucket of possibilities..

Your warning is hours and pages of bookmarks too late.
I think I have found my new obsession and I can not wait to go shopping.

I have found recipies for things that not only sound good, but even purchasing the ingredience is cheaper then how I shop and cook now.

I am saving my pennies for a new stove .
I just realized the other day I have not baked a single thing since we have moved here because I am afraid that the stove does not work. No one should be with out a stove. It has been a pain in the ass.

Now thanks to literally 22 food blog book marks, I need that stove.

My friend has a food blog too. Vegan Lunch box.
Oh man.. some of her food is just wonderful.
Some.. needs meat..

<snort>

I roasted for all comers on Sunday, starting with the delicate veagan stuff, and brats. Mega meat followed...

(I brought my own chow)

One of my favorites (oh, stop me now before I start) is Bitten, the blog by the NYTimes Mark Bittman. He has an ecological bent and works towards simplicity. Not a vegetarian but edging in that direction faster than not.

http://bitten.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/05/whats-bitten/

Oops, here's the actual blog. http://bitten.blogs.nytimes.com/

Recipes (pretty much daily) have links shown to the side..

I made them today.

They were a knock down , drag out success.
Even the swede' thought so.

Yeah, and so, how did you make them?

pretty easily .. I was shocked.

some ground beef, I picked super lean beef
Some ground pork "steaks" essentially that cheap pork meat that is ground and shaped to look like beef chuck steak..
I got the pork at 90/10 so that is where my meat fat came from.

I put the two in a bowl, added some onion powder, allspice, salt and about 4 large leaves of fresh basil
Squished that together really well
On the side I had some pre packaged white seasoned bread crumbs soaking in heavy cream.
After I mashed the meats together ( I will use a food processor next time. My arms are killing me) I put the bred crumbs in and essentially just 'turned them' into the meat.
Rolled that mix into balls and cooked it slowly in 1/2 stick of butter on a low/medium heat.
Once that was done ( about two pans full) I used what butter was left over, added some flour +fresh onion , mixed that together then added about 1/4 cup heavy cream and made gravy out of it.

I have not had a heart attack yet.
But apparently they tasted very 'original' the Swede said and all except the egg which I forgot, the texture was "spot on"

pretty easy actually.
Just.. tedious..

tnx.

I can't do my queen of nirvana thing here since I'm a meatball dummy (oh, wait, where can I do . .oh, never mind)

You'll work out what you like re recipes in general but at best it will take, er, 15 years. On the way of dismissing lots of stuff, pay attention to the side stream.


which is to say, read everything.

read and trash ...

That is how I came up with this idea for the meatballs.
Most recipes require egg, egg whites, milk, oven baking, nutmeg, and.. gosh I dont remember what else.
Sounded like a big production.
But the one thing they all had in common was 2 different meats, one fatty one super lean...and bread crumbs.
All spice was a mandatory seasoning in 90% of what I read, and then cooking with butter.
Simple enough.

So I discarded every other trick I read and didnt measure a thing, just went by what I thought would be good.

Even Jillian gobbled up 5 of them before she even asked what they were.

and... here it is.. what.. over 12 hours later...

i . am. not. hungry.
ha!
those things are so heavy and so rich, I dont feel the need to eat a thing.
I made those around 11, had lunch around 1 split a couple (3 maybe) with Jillian when she got home.. and have not had the urge, need, or feeling to eat again.

Hah, the Bitten blog's subject for the morrow is Swedish Meatballs. Give it a few days and there likely will be interesting comments.

http://bitten.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/05/the-meatball-of-the-matter/

I think I need to go to Ikea and taste their 'meatballs'
According to the Swede, they are not that good, but one of the only places you can get some to take home with you that are not completely disgusting.

Ikea, is almost one hour one way though.

Maybe I could do some shopping while I am there..

Good plan... can yer pick me up a catalogue whilst you're there please

Im wanting to make another batch of these...

Curious though, break crumbs soaked in milk seems to be a LARGE step I missed when I made them the first time... ( though the were gobbled up pretty quickly ! ) I think I should do that this time.

Regular bread crumbs? In a package soaked in milk?
Should I take the time to crumble some seasoned bread and let it dry?
Croutons?

Last time I used Lawrys, no salt, additive free bread ccrumbs, but forgot to soak them, ended up just sprinkling them in to the meat.

eh?