Sweet & Sour Meatballs

In order for dinner not to get ignored in my very hectic life, I like to create a dinner menu for the week on Sundays. Sometimes I actually follow it, sometimes we end up with more leftovers than I anticipated and can skip some things in the menu plan - and sometimes our days just spin out of control and dinner is whatever I can create super fast with whatever is in my kitchen. While these meatballs aren't in this week's menu, we feasted on them last week.

I had decided that I was going to make some sweet and sour meatballs as there is a recipe for them that Levi LOVES! Knowing that my two cuties don't like the sweet and sour meatballs I normally make, I decided to get two pots of sauce going for the meatballs - one with traditional Italian style sauce and the other with the sweet and sour sauce.

I quickly got to work on the Italian style sauce and poured some tomato sauce into a small pot and added some spices. I then got to work on my sweet and sour sauce and sauteed an onion and then opened a can of cranberry sauce and added it to the pot. This was when I realized that the recipe I normally use needs a whole bunch of ketchup - except all I had was one tiny little bottle of ketchup that was almost empty - not nearly enough. (I love ketchup - no clue how we were on empty of this staple!)

I quickly realized that I didn't have enough tomato sauce to make the Italian style meatballs for the whole family - but on the other hand was missing a main ingredient for the sweet and sour meatballs - and that's when I decided to combine the two.

I emptied the pot of tomato sauce, which was seasoned with oregano and garlic and mixed it into the cranberry sauce with onions. I then finished it off by adding the rest of the ingredients needed for the sweet and sour sauce. I quickly rolled the meatballs and dropped them into the boiling sauce - and then waited for dinner to taste my experiment - I was happy to find that my new creation was amazing!

Sooo..here's the recipe for the meatballs in sweet and sour sauce!

Sweet and Sour Meatballs
Sauce: 
Canola oil
1 onion, diced
1 15 oz. can of jellied cranberry sauce
1 29 oz. can of Hunt's Tomato Sauce
A few squeezes of Heinz Ketchup
Brown sugar
Oregano
Garlic powder
A splash of rice vinegar


Sautee the diced onion in a small amount of canola oil. When onions are soft, add the cranberry sauce and mix well. Add the can of tomato sauce, ketchup, oregano, garlic, brown sugar and a splash of rice vinegar. Make sure to mix the sauce frequently so that all of the ingredients become a smooth sauce. Bring to a boil - add meatballs - bring back to a boil and then lower the flame and allow to finish cooking. 


Meatballs:
1 lb ground beef (I use extra lean)
1 egg
A few tablespoons of cornflake crumbs
A few squirts of ketchup
Garlic powder


Mix all ingredients together - shape into meatballs and place in boiling sauce.

Hamburger with Basil-Parsley Dip

Time flies when you are having fun! It has been a year since I decided to marry my love of cooking to my love writing - and create this blog. I have loved sharing my thoughts on all sorts of things and more importantly, have loved bringing you into my kitchen! In the past year  I have posted roughly sixty different "recipes" for all of you cooks out there. One year later, I would love to know which recipes you tried and how they turned out. Did you love them? Did your friends and family love your new recipes? Are there certain types of recipes you wish you had seen more often? As I get ready to move into year two of "Un-Recipes", I would love to hear your thoughts and opinions - feel free to comment on this post or simply drop me an email at rashibrashi@me.com

Of course I can't post without adding a recipe - so I will share my sandwich I created for myself last night - I LOVED it!

Awesome Hamburger Sandwich


Hamburgers (When I made these last night they actually fell apart slightly - but they were broiled to a crisp and made for some delicious, crispy and juicy and crumbly burgers)


1 lb ground beef
Cornflake crumbs (Sorry - I'm not really sure how much I poured in..but it was just enough to get a texture that could be formed into burgers.)
1 egg
Black pepper
Garlic powder


Mix all ingredients together and form into hamburgers. Place on a cookie sheet and broil for a few minutes on low - then flip them over and broil on high until they are as done as you like.


Now for the sandwich part...


1 toasted Challah roll
Ketchup
Basil-Parsley dip (recipe to follow)
1 hamburger
Sliced avocado
Fresh baby spinach (taken from my dressed dinner salad)
Cucumber slices (taken from my dressed dinner salad)

After toasting the Challah roll I split it and spread Ketchup on the bottom half. Then I drizzled a little of the basil-parsley dip on both parts of the roll. Next up was the hamburger on the bottom, topped with avocado slices and then some spinach leaves and cucumber slices were pulled from the salad and placed on top of it all.  Place the top of the roll on top of the pile of yummies and enjoy!


Basil-Parsley Dip


Fresh basil leaves
Fresh Italian parsley leaves
Fresh garlic
Olive oil
Salt

Chop up the basil and parsley and garlic and place in a bowl. Cover the herbs with olive oil and sprinkle on a little salt. Mix and enjoy!

Pesach Is Just Around The Bend...

Many people complain and kvetch as Passover rolls around. They grumble about cleaning their homes, they whine about all the cooking and they fuss about the lack of their favorite foods. While I don’t like cleaning anymore than the next person, I truly love Passover. 

Each year when Passover comes to visit, it gives me an opportunity to reflect on the great miracles G-d performed for the Jewish nation in Egypt and throughout history. When I read about the slavery of the Jewish people, it is a good reminder to be thankful for our freedom. 

When the Passover story took place, G-d commanded the Jewish people to clean their homes of Chametz (leavened foods). He also commanded that forever after Jewish people should eat no Chametz and of course eat Matzah during the Passover holiday. 

While it is true that our regular diets contain lots of Chametz, Passover foods don’t need to be boring or tasteless. In my family we use very few prepared products and primarily use eggs, fish, meat, chicken and lots of fruits of vegetables. With all of the restrictions we still manage to find foods we love and eat more than necessary.

One of our favorite Passover foods is brisket....here is the recipe...Happy Pesach!

Traditional Brisket

1 whole brisket

2 onions, chopped

2 tablespoons olive oil

1/2 cup balsamic vinegar

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Place brisket into a large pan. Chop onions and add to the pan. Drizzle the olive oil, balsamic vinegar and lemon juice onto the brisket. Cover tightly with aluminum foil. 

Bake on 325 for 4 1/2 hours

Spaghetti and Meatballs

It happens to all of us. We have busy days filled with countless things to do and then we realize that somehow dinner needs to be created - and fast. We reach into our brains and scan our list of easy and quick dinners. This happened to me yesterday. Amongst other things, I went to Shalom's first violin recital. I loved watching his smiley face as he gently played the violin. As soon as the recital was over we headed home and then I realized that I had to make dinner quickly.

Having taken out ground beef I decided we would be having mushroom barley soup, spaghetti and meatballs and broccoli for dinner. I got to work and dinner was ready in under an hour.

Spaghetti and meatballs are really easy to make, yet the first time I made them they were not so tasty. I realized that I better get some meatball advice. I decided to call my aunt Breindy.

While I attended high school in Montreal, I lived with my aunt and uncle, Breindy and Berel. Breindy always made delicious meatballs and I loved coming home to yummy hot meatballs after walking home from school in the freezing cold. Breindy told me over the phone how she makes her meatballs. I tried them and they were delicious. 

Of course over time I began to experiment with the meatball dish and here is the recipe the way I made them last night.

Classic Meatballs

1 lb ground beef

A couple of squirts of ketchup

garlic powder

3 cans Hunt's tomato sauce

Oregano

Before starting with the meatballs, set a pot of water to boil for your pasta.

In a pot,bring the tomato sauce to a boil with garlic powder and oregano. While it boils mix the ground beef with ketchup and garlic powder. Form into meatballs and drop into the boiling sauce. Bring sauce back to a boil and then lower the flame as the meatballs finish cooking. Meatballs cook pretty quickly which is a good thing. 

When I have more time on my hands I have all kinds of variations to this recipe. Sometimes I will put eggs and bread crumbs and even chopped onion into the meatball mixture. Other times I will first sauté an onion and fresh garlic in the pot before adding the tomato sauce. There are also times where I throw in some fresh basil. When I am in a hurry, I stick with this very simple recipe and it's a winner every time.