Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Garam Masala Meatballs

Garam Masala Meatballs

I reallyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy like meatballs.  In fact, I like them so much, I make them every week.  I eat them as a meal, snack, breakfast, whatever.  They are convenient and the biggest bonus of all: they taste even better as leftovers.


After eating Marvelous Meatballs from Everyday Paleo almost every week for maybe the past eight months, I decided to search Sarah's site for another meatball recipe.  I am also a huge fan of her Curried Meatballs, except I like to make them crock pot style with a lot more sauce.  I came across "Meatballs too tasty for Super Bowl Sunday" recipe and decided to try it.  This is currently my favorite meatball recipe!


These are great to make, especially if I don't want to wait eight hours for my crock pot meatballs to be ready.  They also don't need to be cooked in the oven.  They actually taste better cooked on the stove top.  I modified the recipe a bit to my likings.  I am not a huge fan of dried cherries, so instead I put in dried, juice-sweetened cranberries.  I also tried this recipe with a fresh apple.  Less chewy but also very good.  I alternate between the two, depending on what I have at home.  Below is the recipe, with my modifications.

Tools:

Ingredients for the Meatballs:
  • 2lb Ground Grass-Fed Beef
  • 1/2 cup Dried Cranberries (or 1 small apple), finely chopped
  • 5 cloves of fresh Garlic, minced
  • 1/2 cup fresh Cilantro, finely chopped
  • 1/2 Tsp Sea Salt
  • 1/2 Tbsp Garam Masala
  • 1 Egg
  • Black Pepper
  • Cayenne Pepper (optional)
  • 2 Tbsp Coconut Oil
Ingredients for the Sauce:
  • 1 6oz can of Tomato Paste
  • 1 can Coconut Milk
  • 1.5 Tsp Garam Masala
  • 1/2 Tsp Sea Salt
  • 5 Green Onion, finely chopped
  • Pan drippings from meatball

Instructions:
  1. Gather all ingredients.  Chop up the cilantro, dried cranberries, and green onion.
    2. Ingredients.  In this picture I have dried cranberries, but for the cooking pictures, I made them with an apple.
  2. Using your hands, mix up all the meatball ingredients except for the coconut oil in a mixing bowl.
    3. Hmm also cranberries in this picture.
  3. In a large pan, heat the coconut oil over medium heat.  Make sure your pan is nice and hot before you start adding your meatballs.  Once the pan is hot, form golf-ball sized meatballs and add it to the pan.  Cook for 3-5 minutes on each side, or until brown.  Remove the meatballs and set aside.  OR if you are lazy, just keep them in the pan, with the pan drippings.
    4. Meatballs cooking.  Apples.  Adding a pinch of cinnamon when making these with apples are good too.
  4. (While your meatballs are cooking), add the tomato paste, spices, green onion, and pan drippings to the sauce pan over medium heat.  Use a whisk to blend the ingredients together.  Slowly add the coconut milk, whisking as you pour.  Once the sauce is well mixed, bring it to a simmer and let it cook for ~3minutes.
    5. All sauce ingredients except for the coconut milk
    6. Adding the coconut milk.
  5. Add the meatballs and sauce back to the large pan.  Cover the pan and cook for 3 minutes.  Turn the meatballs over so they are coated with the sauce.  Cover and cook for another 3 minutes.  
    7. Almost done.
Serve with some chopped green onions on top and enjoy!  

8. Delicious!

Along with the Coconut Energy Bars, I also brought these to the Sac Throwdown and they were a hit.  We all ate it for breakfast, haha.


Related Recipes: Marvelous Meatballs, Yummy Dumplings