I hardly cook meat.
I'm tall and all of my children are shorter than me and I don't understand why. Usually the next generation is taller. When I saw a show about the development of Homo sapiens, The first thing that came to my attention was the change in height when people started to eat meat. Immediately I felt that maybe I should feed my children more meat, although It is not in my nature to buy and bring it home.
Since then, I make 3 meat dishes once a month: Meatballs, Chicken Soup and Goulash. Maybe one day after a meatball dinner, they will go to sleep and wake up taller than me?! Maybe??
These are our delicious meatballs.
You can use organic ground beef or turkey, or mix them together.
Note: Remove the ground beef from the fridge an hour before cooking. It is best to work at room temperature.
You can replace the butternut squash with other vegetables like potato, zucchini, cauliflower...
WHAT YOU NEED
For the meatballs (30-35 balls)
- 500gr organic ground turkey or beef
- 1 medium onion
- 1 carrot
- 1 zucchini
- 1 potato
- 1 garlic clove
-½ tomato
- ½ cup chopped dill
- 1 egg
- 3 tbsp olive oil
-
½ cup bread crumbs (or 1 cup of Whole Wheat Flour)
- 1 slice of bread (optional)
- 1 tsp salt
- ⅓ tsp ground black pepper
For oven tray:
- 4 tbsp olive oil
For the sauce:
- ¼ cup olive oil
- 1 onion, finely chopped
- ½ butternut squash, cut to small cubes
In a blender:
- 3 soft tomatoes
- 3 tbsp tomato paste
- 4 garlic cloves
- 1 jalapeño, chopped
- 10 fresh basil leaves
- ½ cup chopped parsley
- 1 tsp sugar
- ½ tsp ground cumin
- 1½ cup water
- 1½ tsp salt
- ⅓ tsp ground black pepper
HOW TO MAKE
- Preheat the oven to 385F/190C.
The meatballs mixture
- In a mixing bowl, add the room temperature ground beef.
- In a food processor or with a grater, grate on the small holes the carrot, zucchini, potato, and garlic. Grate the onion on the big holes.
- Cut the tomato into small cubes. Add to the bowl along with the egg, bread crumbs, olive oil, and chopped dill.
- Dampen the bread slice and break into small pieces. Add to the bowl.
- Add salt and pepper. Mix well for 3-4 minutes.
- On an oven tray with parchment paper, spread the 4 tbsp of olive oil over the parchment paper.
- With some olive oil on your hands, shape the mix into balls and place them on parchment paper. You will get about 30-35 balls.
- Bake for 25-30 minutes.
- No need to turn the meatballs in the oven.
The sauce:
- In a wide pot, add the olive oil with finely chopped onion and saute for 3 minutes.
- Add the butternut squash to the pot and stir.
- In a blender, add the tomato, garlic, tomato paste, jalapeno, basil, parsley, cumin, sugar, salt, black pepper and water. Blend until it becomes a thick sauce. (if you think it is too watery, no, it's not.)
- Add the sauce to the pot, stir in with the sauteed onion and continue cooking on medium heat, uncovered for 10 mins. The sauce will begin to reduce, with a deeper color and flavor.
- Remove the meatballs from the oven and add them to the pot with the juices from the oven tray.
- Cover the pot, shake it back and forth gently on the stove to mix the sauce and meatballs. Continue cooking for 30 minutes on medium-low heat.
Serving suggestion:
I like to serve the meatballs on mashed potatoes or rice, with lettuce salad on the side.
