Have you ever made your own breadcrumbs? Well, meatballs weren’t the only things I was making for the first time yesterday. This recipe proved to be rather difficult, purely because I battled to find the ingredients that I needed. Both Woolworths and Pick n Pay proved to be rather difficult…although I did finally find a bottle of Steers prego sauce, which I’ve been looking for for a couple of months.

Firstly let me give you the run down of the breadcrumbs:

Place a couple of slices of bread or hot dog rolls cut in half (any variety is fine really) on a baking sheet in a cool oven (about 120 degrees Celsius) for about 2 hours. Once completely dried out, put in a food processor and whizz into crumbs. Voila! I had a few rolls leftover from last week so I used these and put the extra crumbs in a tub in the freezer for future use.

The recipe calls for chicken and pork mince….wow, is that hard to find. I finally found chicken mince at the Pick n Pay in Claremont because they have two butcheries due to religious requirements (can’t remember if it was kosher or halaal).  But pork mince was nowhere to be found….so I substituted Ostrich and beef mince. A little richer, but very tasty.

Ok, let me give you the recipe before I continue with my experiences.

Taken from the Fairlady Food Spring 2010 magazine, page 56.

Chicken and pork meatballs with wholewheat pasta and tomato sauce

(Serves 4-6)

For the meatballs:

• 250g chicken mince
• 250g pork mince
• 2tbsp olive oil
• 1 small onion, grated (not so easy, so try to use an electric chopper)
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped (I used two teaspoons of crushed garlic from a bought tub)
• 1tbsp fresh sage, finely chopped (Woolworths sells freeze dried herbs which are handy for long term storage)
• half a cup of fresh wholewheat breadcrumbs (or any that you can find or make)
• Sea salt and black pepper

To make the meatballs, heat the olive oil in a pan and sweat (i.e. low heat) the onion and garlic until sweet and caramelised. Mix with the mince, sage, breadcrumbs, salt and pepper. (I added an egg to help bind it.)

Wet hands and roll mince into small balls. Place meatballs on a tray lined with greaseproof paper and refrigerate until ready to use.

(This can also be done while sauce is simmering, or in advance)

For the tomato sauce:

• Quarter cup of Olive oil
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped (as with the meatballs, I used 2 tsps of the bought tub)
• 1tsp fresh or dried origanum
• 3 x 400g tins chopped Italian tomatoes
• 1tbsp sugar
• Sea salt and black pepper

This can also be done a little in advance and just reheated when ready to make the sauce.

Heat olive oil in a medium sized pot or deep saucepan and gently sauté (higher heat than sweating) the garlic and origanum for 1 minute.

Add tinned tomatoes, sugar, salt and pepper and bring to a gentle simmer. Allow to simmer uncovered for half an hour or until the tomatoes have reduced and the flavours have intensified.

To serve:

• 500g wholewheat pasta (or any pasta you prefer) cooked according to packet instructions
• Grated Parmesan
• Fresh origanum
• Rocket leaves

About 30 minutes before you want to eat, reheat the tomato sauce and add the meatballs. Simmer, partially covered, for 20 minutes (may need longer if meatballs are bigger), until meatballs are cooked through.

Toss the meatballs and sauce through the cooked pasta and top with grated Parmesan cheese, fresh origanum and rocket.

(I just used Parmesan and Rocket for garnishing. The rocket really helps in breaking the richness of the tomato sauce.)

A lot of my meatballs ended up breaking, but this helped to speed up the cooking process and was still just as yummy!

And this time I remembered to take a photo, even if the food styling wasn’t up to much:

Ostrich and Beef Meatballs

This was a really yummy dish, despite the changes and shopping frustrations. My husband would’ve preferred it to have a bit of a kick, but for me it was just fine. If you are more spicy inclined, perhaps Tabasco or some chopped chillies? Let me know what it’s like.

Although this seems like a long recipe, it didn’t take that long and if you are entertaining, you can make the meatballs the day before and then it’ll only be about half an hour in the kitchen while your guests are there.  I think that a huge serving bowl filled with this would look gorgeous, just don’t forget to put extra Parmesan and rocket on the table for the guests to add their own.

P.S. I really like it with the Ostrich and Beef mince so not sure I will go hunting for chicken and pork mince again.