Mozzarella meat balls in vegetable sauce
The winning recipe for the contest "A Recipe And A Picture" at All Foods Natural, Spring 2009. Delicious!
Ingredients
1⁄2 pound meat (ground lean beef)
1 1⁄2 onion (small, chopped, 1/2 onion for balls, 1 for sauce)
1 tablespoon chives (chopped)
2 cloves garlic (finely chopped, 1 clove for balls, 1 for sauce)
2 tablespoons cornstarch (half for balls, half for sauce)
1 egg (beaten, 1 small or 1/2 large)
16 cheese (small mozzarella balls)
3 tablespoons olive oil (1 Tbs for balls, 2 for sauce)
5 tomato (large, diced)
1 bell pepper (small, diced)
2 tablespoons pureed tomato
cheese (a few shavings of Parmesan)
5 ounces pasta (dried weight, spaghetti or tagliatelle)
Instructions
- Boil the spaghetti in a pan of salted water until soften. Drain and keep warm.
- Place the meatballs ingredients except the Mozzarella cheese balls and the olive oil in a food processor and turn onto pulsate until the ground beef form into a meat mixture.
- Divide the mixture into 16 equal portion. Roll each piece of meat mixture into a ball and then flatten the ball into a round disc. Place a Mozzarella ball in the center of each disc and seal the disc round the mozzarella. Make 16 meatballs.
- To make the sauce: Heat the olive oil in a pan. Sweat garlic and onion without browning. Add tomatoes and peppers and fry for 2 minutes. Add in the tomato puree and 3/4 cup water. Bring to the boil. Simmer for 5 minutes. Add in the fresh herbs. Season with salt and pepper. Thicken with the cornstarch blended with 1 Tbs water.
- Heat the olive oil in a frying pan. Fry the meat balls until they are slightly brown on the outside. Pour in the vegetable sauce and simmer for 10 minutes till the meat balls are cooked and the cheese is melted inside.
- Place the spaghetti in a warm plate. Put the meat balls and the sauce on top of the of spaghetti. Garnish with shavings of Parmesan and a spring of basil.
Yield
4 servings
Preparation time
20 minutes
Cooking time
30 minutes
Total time
50 minutes
Notes
For the sauce, use 1/2 yellow or orange bell pepper, 1/2 green bell pepper for color.
Source
moderate, sauté, simmer
pasta, appetizer, entrée, dinner
American food recipes
Food in U.S.A.
Food in U.S.A.