Parmigiano-Reggiano | These Two Hands

Show of hands; Who likes tender juicy meatballs??

Yea, me too.

This recipe kind of happened by accident. Well, maybe less an accident and perhaps more divine intervention. Who cares about the why or the how, though, these chubby little guys turned out delicious!

I must warn you though, every time I make meatballs my boys tell me that they’re the best ones I’ve ever made. So, if we meet back here next month (the next time I make them again) and I have a new recipe for my very best meatballs…don’t blame me!

The accident part is that they involve ground turkey. Which, I think any self-respecting meatball lover/maker would agree that lean (i.e. flavorless) meats are not usually invited to the meatball party. I pretty much never buy ground turkey either but when I left the market with my groceries this time there was a pound of it in with all my other goodies. I’m not one to complain about free food so I decided to use it and hope for the best.

And, surprisingly, that’s what I got.

I’m just sharing my meatball recipe here but if you want my recipe for red sauce I can share that sometime soon. (?)

Ingredients:

1 lb 90/10 ground beef

1/2 lb ground turkey

3 Tbsp tomato paste

1/2 cup grated parmesan

1/4 cup panko bread crumbs

1 large egg

1/4 cup good red wine

1/4 cup chopped fresh herbs (oregano, thyme and rosemary)

1 tsp crushed red pepper

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp onion powder

salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 400 degrees and line a baking sheet with aluminum foil.

Put everything into a bowl and mix together gently. Don’t leave weird clumps of tomato paste and unmixed egg but you don’t want to over mix it either. The heat from your hands will begin to melt the fat and that’s no bueno.

Make golf ball-ish sized balls and line them up on the baking sheet. I got 21 meatballs out of this. Bake them until they look nicely browned. I’m ashamed to admit that I have no idea how long this takes. I don’t do timers or watch clocks so I don’t even have a guess.

Once they are done (you can check by breaking one open) I nestle my little handsomes in a pot of red sauce (set to low) and then grate parm over them, lid the pot and let them sit there for a few minutes while I set the table and/or drink a glass of wine.