Spiced Goat Mince Meatballs in a Roast Tomato & Pepper Sauce

These meatballs were just a bit off the cuff on a Friday night faffing about in the kitchen; I had a packet of goat mince that needed cooking and made it up as I went along. They turned out to be an absolute triumph, and one that I can't wait to make again. I flavoured the meatballs with fennel and coriander seeds, roast them and tossed them in a roast tomato and red pepper sauce, it was so delicious! If you haven't had much goat in the past I would highly recommend it, not as strong as lamb or beef, just a really delicate beautiful flavour, try it out...

Start with the tomatoes, I used a packet of regular sized vine tomatoes. Cut them into quarters and pop them into a baking tray, add a generous splash of olive oil, a pinch of salt, a teaspoon of sugar and some black pepper, give it a good mix and then pop it in the oven at 200˚C for 30 minutes, keep an eye on them as all tomatoes differ. You want it to start to colour and most of the water to cook away, until they start to look a bit sticky and caramelised. When they are ready tip them into a little blender and wizz them up until smooth, they almost become creamy. It's my new favourite way of making a tomato sauce, especially while tomatoes are in season I much prefer this roast fresh tomato method rather than using tins.

While you are waiting for the tomatoes you can start the meatballs. I used one slice of stale brown sourdough bread, crusts removed, wizzed up into a fine crumb. Put the bread crumbs into a bowl and added a splash of milk and leave them to soak.

Toast a teaspoon of coriander seeds and half a teaspoon of fennel seeds in a small pan until you can smell them, then pop them into a pestle and mortar and grind until you get a rough powder.

I used 400g of goat meat for 2 people, this was quite generous, and would feed 3 easily! I get my goat meat from The Goat Company who trade at Jesmond Food market, on the third Saturday of the month. Get a few packs and keep it in the freezer, it really is such delicious meat.

Crumble the mince into a big bowl and add the spices. Then add half a finely chopped onion, a grated clove of garlic, a big pinch of maldon sea salt, some black pepper and the bread crumbs; and mix it all together. Then form into balls and roll together in your hands, about the size of a golf ball.

Put them into a baking tray with some olive oil and a thinly sliced red pepper, coating everything in oil before putting them in the oven. Bake them for 25 minutes, but give them a shake after 10 minutes. They should take on a bit of colour but you don't want them to cook for too long and dry out.

While they were in the oven I cooked a sliced onion in a bit of oil and butter until golden, then added the blitzed tomato sauce into the pan to warm through. A lot of fat came out of my meatballs, which was great as they ended up so juicy, so instead of adding the sauce into the baking tray I scooped them out of the fat with the peppers and tossed them into the sauce in the pan.

Serve with some buttery polenta and some chopped fresh sage. They were SO good, really juicy delicious meatballs and the sauce was lovely and rich, perfect with buttery polenta and little bursts of sage.

Wild Garlic Harissa

The wild garlic is back in abundance, I looked a few weeks ago and it had just started, a few shoots here and there, but nothing more than a dainty garnish. A little bit of sunshine and suddenly there's a carpet of it. I filled a bin bag full last week and started to think of things I could do that I hadn't tried before...

I've made a lot of wild garlic pesto in the past, it's good in obvious things like pasta or a poached chicken salad. I like it drizzled into soup, particularly a new season nettle soup. I made some in Cook House last year and loved it. I also hadn't known until then that the new young nettle shoots don't sting you, you can just pick them with your bare hands... I'm still quite tentative though...  

Last week I made a form of green harissa for some canapes I was serving; a little fresh cheese and green harissa tart with sumac and pine nuts, they were really pretty tasty. I used coriander, parsley and rocket as the green base, but thought it would be good with wild garlic too. This green harissa is a mild form of Zhoug, a middle eastern green chilli paste.

I used two chillis, deseeded and chopped up, 60g coriander, 60g wild garlic, juice of quarter of a lemon, a pinch of salt, a good grind of black pepper. Then lightly toast half a teaspoon of coriander seeds, half a teaspoon of cumin seeds and half a teaspoon of cardamom seeds, and crush them until they are a fine powder in a pestle and mortar. Add this to your green mix and blitz the whole lot, gradually adding a stream of olive oil until you have a thick paste. It's delicious, a bit like a pesto but it has heat and spice and depth to it. It was delicious with my homemade fresh cheese.

I also added it to a salad of beetroot, feta and green lentils, lovely. A warning not to have it and go straight to a meeting, it tends to stay with you for a little while! Next up I'm trying some wild garlic oil, which you can use to drizzle into soups or salads, but sounds like it might be good to make mayonnaise with too... fried chicken and wild garlic mayo I'm thinking...

Smoked Beef Ribs

Ok so this is another smoker recipe, and if you scroll down the page pretty much the last recipe I posted was a smoker recipe, and I don’t want to come across like a smoker show off, but I do have a smoker and I’ve been smoking stuff so I thought I’d tell you about it... again... because it is better than telling you about either nothing, or a bad apple risotto that seemed like a good idea but wasn’t...

I was given the Pitt Cue cookbook as a belated birthday present recently. It tells the story of Pitt Cue’s evolution from a trailer on the South Bank to their own little restaurant in Soho, building their own smokers and devising their own rubs, sauces and smoking techniques. These days they are even farming their own Pitt Pigs, I’d love my own pigs... It’s a canny little tale and is full of amazing looking smoked stuff.

Only it is DEAD complicated. I want to make the ‘Mother Sauce’ but to do that I have to first make beef stock and pork stock, fresh. I’d like to make the BBQ sauce to go with my lovely beef rib, but first I need to make a spice mix AND homemade Chipotle ketchup... I make a lot of stuff from scratch but this seems a bit of a faff on. They probably don’t expect people to make most of the things, but that makes me want to give it a go... The drinks and pickles look a bit more accessible. So  I improvised, missed some steps out and sacked off the BBQ sauce and ended up with a bloody lovely beef rib rack...

I made their ‘House Rub’, there’s enough to rub a house, so make a half or a quarter of this if you only have one piece of meat like I did. It comprised of 10g of fennel seeds, 1 teaspoon of cumin seeds, 1 teaspoon of black peppercorns and 1 teaspoon of coriander seeds, toasted in a dry pan for a few minutes, then ground up in a pestle and mortar. Add to a large bowl 100g of soft brown sugar, 50g granulated sugar, 10g garlic powder, 100g of fine salt, 15g of smoked paprika, 30g of regular paprika, 1 teaspoon of dried oregano and 1 teaspoon of cayenne. I threw in some mustard powder too... See, it’s a LOT of stuff. Mix it all together and you have your rub...

The beef was a lovely 4 bone beef rib rack from Charlotte’s butchery, which I covered all over in every nook and cranny with the rub. It was enough for four people, or two if you're really greedy, we just ate it for two days.

So we set Mr. Smokerson up, charcoal burning nice and white, water bowl in, temperature hanging around 110°C or 230°F, put the little metal box of wood chips onto the coals and in went the rib, not to be seen again for 6 hours, so we went for a walk. There is a massive bit of fat that runs through the middle of the rib that keeps it really moist but also has to break down so takes some time. When it is done the meat pulls away from the bone and is soft, sticky, smoky and delicious. We had it with mustardy coleslaw, lentils done like baked beans and some buttery polenta, perhaps an odd mix, but a pretty tasty one...

Beef Meatballs with Broad Beans, Lemon and Herbs

I spent some time in London last week... It was a flying visit to catch up on what was going on down there in shops, restaurants and galleries. Have a look at some new pop-ups, architecture, interiors, handbags... I was quickly calculating how many meals I could fit into the short time I was there. I loved Upstairs at the Ten Bells, my favourite of the weekend I think, elements of secret dining above a packed Spitalfields boozer, amazing food, lovely people, beautiful cosy dining room... tick.

Other highlights were Ducksoup in Soho, a seat in the window and a glass of red wine saw me in holiday mode pretty quickly. They had a turntable by the door, daily hand written menus and lovely booze list on wipe down white ceramic tiles - octopus with paprika and capers was great, a duck egg you had to peel with mayonnaise and sumac to dip was cute and tasty... Venison with potatoes, olives and aioli at the Canton Arms in Vauxhall hit the spot for lunch, and a piece of morcilla with soft red peppers and a little fried quail's egg at Morito would do me right just about now...

Before stuffing myself silly in London I had been immersing myself in Ottolenghi's book Jerusalem, much like every other food blog I read it seems. But these meatballs were just a bit too lovely to not tell you about for the sake of being different... Delicious fresh, lemony and herby, a nice contrast to my usual lamb meatballs, cooked in a lovely fragrant broth with broad beans, garlic and spring onions. Definitely my best Jerusalem experiment so far...

 

These amounts will serve 4 people. Start with the meat ball mix; 300g of minced beef and 150g of minced lamb, I got mine from Charlotte's Butchers, a cute little butchers newly opened in Gosforth. Add the mince to a bowl with a finely diced medium onion, 120g of breadcrumbs, 2 tablespoons each of chopped parsley, mint, dill and coriander. Add 2 cloves of finely chopped garlic, 1 tablespoon of ground cumin, 2 teaspoons of chopped capers, 1 beaten egg and 1 tablespoon on Baharat spice mix. You can buy this or you can make it...

 

I made myself a little jar by bashing together a mix of spices in a pestle and mortar: 1 teaspoon of black peppercorns, 1 teaspoon of coriander seeds, 1 small cinnamon stick, ½ teaspoon of cloves, ½ teaspoon of ground allspice, 2 teaspoons of cumins seeds, 1 teaspoon of cardamom seeds and ½ a teaspoon of ground nutmeg. Grind it all to a powder...

Roll the mix into meatballs the size of a ping pong ball and then fry them in batches in hot olive oil, until they are brown all over. I did mine in 2 batches for about 5 minutes each. Then remove them all from the pan and wipe it clean and add 2 tablespoons of fresh olive oil. Then sauté 4 sprigs of thyme, 6 cloves of garlic sliced and 8 spring onions cut into 2cm pieces for about 3 minutes. The recipe calls for 350g of blanched broad beans, half shelled and half unshelled, I couldn’t get any so added a tin of broad beans at this point. Also add 1 ½ tablespoons of lemon juice, 80ml of chicken stock, ¼ teaspoon of salt and lots of black pepper and cook for ten minutes on a low heat.

 

Return the meatballs to the pan and add another 420ml of chicken stock and simmer for 25 minutes. I found the meatballs soaked up a lot of the sauce so don’t worry if it seems a lot. You can also cook them to this point and reheat them later if needs be. Just before you serve them add a handful of chopped mint, dill, parsley and coriander, a tablespoon of lemon juice and a handful of fresh blanched peeled broad beans if you have them.

I served the meatballs with some steamed rice, they are delicious and sticky with a fresh tasty broth full of lemon and herbs. It is a lot of ingredients as Ottolenghi recipes often are, but is definitely worth the time and effort, I'll be making them again asap.

 

Breakfast Burritos with Avocado, Tomato and Chorizo

TLI and I ate burritos at the weekend to fortify ourselves before tackling the allotment on Saturday, and again on Sunday to fortify ourselves before tackling Sunderland at home... They are his concoction really, not mine, a take on an American Breakfast Burrito, or a Mexican Burrito. The combinations of filling can be swapped, changed, left in, left out, whatever you fancy really. Filling being the operative word however, they will keep you going all day long and more... I like the combination of avocado, tomatoes and herbs with chorizo in this version, it seems a little bit more fresh than the more traditional Mexican Burrito filled with beef, refried beans, cheese and sour cream...
 

A little left over rice is preferable, but as I didn’t have any I cooked a handful of white long grain rice in some salted water. Chop some cherry tomatoes, a handful of coriander and dice up some chorizo. Just make as much as you fancy, hunger levels and numbers of people depending. One packed burrito is enough for me, TLI can polish off two...

Mash an avocado with a pinch of salt, a little splash of olive oil and a squeeze of lemon juice. Heat your tortilla wraps in the oven, wrapped in tin foil to stop them drying out. They only take about 10 minutes in a medium oven. Fry off the diced chorizo and lightly scramble 2 large free range eggs while the wraps heat up.

Then simply assemble, a little rice, some eggs, topped with chorizo, tomatoes, avocado and coriander, down the middle of the tortilla. Fold the end up a little, then fold each of the sides inwards to form a wrap... I really like the colours in each of the bowls, it's a pretty meal, a little kit of parts laid out on the table that you have to assemble yourself. The freshness of the tomatoes, coriander and avocado is delicious with creamy eggs and spicy chorizo. Make sure you are pretty hungry before embarking on these little fellas...

Bread and Butter Pickle

I am warm... The heating is fixed, the boiler works, Ted saved the day... It means that I can think about foods for reasons other than the amount of heat they give out. Like this little pickle... I made a few jars of it for Christmas hampers, and now that Christmas is all but a distant memory I am still thoroughly enjoying it. It is based on a Bread and Butter Pickle that Rick Stein sells in his Cornish empire, I was given a jar as a present a few years ago and loved it. I haven’t found an exact recipe so this is a combination of a few that I may continue to tweak further, but is still pretty damn tasty...

The name is confusing, it doesn’t have any bread or butter in it... I've struggled to find an explanation, well at least a consistent one. It does define it from a sweet pickle or a dill pickle, and is often served with hamburgers in America, but I don’t know why exactly it is called bread and butter. I find it delicious with cold or smoked fish, salmon, cooked ham and even with cheese and biscuits.

As a process it is much easier to make than many other pickles, just heating the vinegar sugar and spices and adding the cucumber. That's it really... So in a large bowl thinly slice 1 large cucumber, 1 large onion and 1 green pepper. If you like a crunchy pickle go a little thicker, but I like the way all the ingredients mingle when really thinly sliced. Add 30g salt to the sliced vegetables and mix it well so the salt is evenly distributed. Cover the whole lot with a layer of ice cubes and leave to stand at room temperature for 2 hours.

In a large pan mix 100g caster sugar, 120ml cider vinegar, ¼ of a teaspoon of ground turmeric, 1 tablespoon of mustard seeds, 1 tablespoon of coriander seeds and ¼ of a teaspoon of celery seed. Bring it to the boil and then add the cucumber mix. Drain off any melted ice water but the salt should stay so don’t rinse anything... Then bring it all to the boil again, remove from the heat immediately it starts to boil and then leave to cool. Store the pickle in sterilised jars and keep them in the fridge once opened, it is ready to eat after about 24 hours.

It is a tangy spiced pickle but also quite sweet, not in the same way as a sweet apple pickle, perhaps a bit more sweet and sour at the same time. It is delicious in a sandwich, it goes perfectly with pastrami and salad on thick brown buttered bread... Have it with cured meats, charcuterie or smoked salmon or with some hard cheese and oaty biscuits...

Green Bean and Chickpea Herb Salad

I'm having a salad week. Especially salads that are easy; so when I get back from Ikea and town shopping hell there isn't further stress inside the house. I am also fearing the perpetual state of festive fullness that is fast approaching, I'm preparing with a light salady week as best I can... Christmas eating can be somewhat overwhelming, it's best to be prepared...

Start by boiling about 150g of green beans in some salted water until they are cooked but still have a bit of bite. Then simply chop half a red onion and add to a bowl with a drained and rinsed can of chickpeas. Add a handful of parsley and a handful of coriander both roughly chopped. Then heat a splash of olive oil in a pan and add a chopped clove of garlic, when it is hot toss the drained green beans in the garlic oil and fry for a few minutes.

Finally dress the chickpea mixture with a splash of extra virgin olive oil, a splash of balsamic vinegar and some salt and pepper, mix everything up and add the warm green beans and their garlicky oil. Serve as a light lunch with salad leaves or as a side dish. The warm garlicky beans with creamy chickpeas, herbs and tangy onions were delicious as I slowly calmed down from my Christmas shopping ordeal...

Leek Fritters

This recipe for leek fritters comes from the Ottolenghi book 'Plenty', it is an old Turkish family recipe that is really delicious. I was in Turkey twice last year, once for a few days in Istanbul and earlier in the year on the south Mediterranean coast for a very relaxing week. It is a beautiful area. We were staying near the coast which is very dramatic with huge cliffs dropping to tiny little pebble coves that you have to walk down hundreds of steps to reach. But drive twenty minutes inland and we were up in high mountains covered with huge pine trees, with fast rivers full of fresh water trout.

The mountain drive took us home through huge rocky dry mountains surrounding low lush green plateaus of farm land, growing millions and millions of tomatoes as well as corn, aubergines and chickpeas. When we eventually found our way back to the coast, after a few hours longer than planned, we came across a tiny little road side fish restaurant... They had one little boat moored on the rocks, a few chickens and some funny looking dogs, we were brought a green salad with pomegranate seeds and a syrupy pomegranate dressing, thin fried potatoes and a big tray of different sized, shaped and coloured fresh fish to point at which ones we wanted. I can't even remember which ones we went for, but everything was delicious, sat in the sun after being a bit lost in the mountains for most of the day...

To start the leek fritters chop 3 leeks into 2cm thick slices. These amounts will serve 4 people. Finely chop 5 shallots and sauté them together in a pan, on a low heat, with about 60ml of olive oil until they are soft, for about 15 minutes.

While they are cooking you can make the herb yoghurt sauce. Add 100g of Greek yoghurt, 100g of soured cream, 2 crushed cloves of garlic, 2 tablespoons of lemon juice, 3 tablespoons of olive oil, half a teaspoon of salt, 20g of parsley leaves and 30g of coriander leaves to the blender and blitz for a few minutes until it is a green creamy sauce. If you don't want to make the sauce, or don't have a blender, the fritters are still delicious with just a squeeze of lemon.

Take a large bowl and add all of the following: one chopped red chilli, 25g of chopped parsley leaves, ¾ teaspoon of ground coriander, 1 teaspoon of ground cumin, ¼ teaspoon of ground turmeric, ¼ teaspoon of ground cinnamon, 1 teaspoon of sugar and half a teaspoon of salt. When the leeks and shallots are really soft add them to this mix and let them cool down.

Now whisk one egg white to soft peaks and add it to the cooled leeks. In another bowl mix together 120g of self raising flour, 1 teaspoon of baking powder, one whole egg, 150ml of milk and 55g of melted unsalted butter and mix everything together to make a light batter. Then stir this batter into the leek mix.

Finally heat 60ml of olive oil in a large frying pan. Spoon four large dollops of the mix into the pan to form four fritters, you will get about eight in total from the mix. Fry them for 2 or 3 minutes on each side until golden. Serve them warm with the sauce and a pile of salad...

Warm lentil, cherry tomato and halloumi salad

The weather has been lovely in Newcastle this week, a tiny bit warmer and lovely sunny days with bright blue skies. I had a little photo shoot in the allotment on Monday for an article about the blog, I'm not sure how the photos will turn out but at least it was a beautiful day! I have planted some broad beans and built a little wigwam for them to grow up, and the sweet peas have appeared as tiny little delicate green shoots on my window sill... My first successful plants of the year.

It definitely feels springy and time to move on from stews. I'm going up to Northumberland this weekend and am hoping it might stay sunny enough for a picnic. With coats on I imagine... I think this dish would be lovely as part of a summer picnic. It is a recipe from the BBC Good Food website and very tasty.

Rinse about 75g of puy or green lentils until they are clean, put them in a pan of cold water and onto the heat. I used green as I couldn't find any puy in Byker Morrisons. Follow the cooking instructions on the lentils, mine had to boil for 10 minutes then simmer for 30 minutes with a pinch of salt. I had to top the water up now and again as well.

Chop up a couple of handfuls of cherry tomatoes into halves, and finely slice a quarter of a red onion. These amounts are for one bowl of salad so just multiply them up depending on how many people you are serving.

Crush half a small clove of garlic and chop it up finely, add this to the tomatoes with the juice of quarter of a lemon and a bit of olive oil, salt and pepper.

Thinly slice about 90g of halloumi and brush it with a little olive oil, put it under the grill until it browns, keep an eye on it as it only takes about 5 minutes. Turn it over about half way through to lightly brown each side but keeping the cheese soft in the middle.

When the lentils are done drain them, and add them to the tomato mixture. Stir through a handful of coriander and top with the grilled halloumi. Drizzle a little olive oil over the warm cheese. It is really tasty with the still warm lentils and cheese, and sharp fresh tomatoes, herbs and dressing.