Recipe - meatballs

Frugal Friday

Mummy's Mammoth Meatballs

After a few treats over Christmas, it is back to being careful again in our household. We are not hard up in comparison to so many, but with 3 kids money can disappear very quickly! As I have said before I resent spending our hard earned money without thought and am learning to be more intentional about where and how to spend, resulting in some good savings and more money available to spend on the things we really want.

Frugal Friday 2013

I have had a few requests for some of the recipes that I use for my batch baking family meals so I thought I would start 2013 off with some of those. I need to stock my freezer up again as we relied heavily on these freezer meals whilst I was ill over Christmas, but it meant that everyone still ate well!

I am one of those cooks whose recipes tend to change slightly as the mood takes me and as the larder allows, but I think this adds variety! So do change the things you don't like about this recipe. Adding chilli flakes is a good one. Throw in a spare box of stuffing mix to bind these meatballs together - this is another favourite. Or cut down on the liver if your kids are not big fans.

They are pretty robust. 

There is not much damage you can do with them!

The name Mummy's Mammoth meatballs is not of course the proper name for this dish . It is actually Faggots, which has a different meaning in certain parts of the world and I don't like the name anyway. However, a faggot ( in food terms!) is a pork and liver based meatball, but when the kids saw how big they were compared to the normal beef ones I make they declared 

"Look at Mummy's Mammoth Meatballs" 

....and of course for good or bad that is what they are called. It gives us a good laugh every time anyway.

 Rename as you wish!

These are the measurements for a meal for 5. I make 3 times this in one go and freeze 2 meals. The meatballs are about the size of a tennis ball ( just a bit smaller), but make them the size that suit you - too small and they may fall apart.

Ingredients

Meatballs

750g pack of mince pork

400g minced lambs liver ( or chopped yourself in processor)

Quarter a loaf of breadcrumbs 

One large onion

Fresh chopped herbs ( what you can get - sage and rosemary. Fennel or coriander to add taste.)
One egg

Flour to place meatballs on

Sauce:

Basically to create a 'gravy' for them to cook in. I make a tomato based one as that is what my kids like. Anything goes here.....

Carton of passata

One large onion

Large blob of butter!

Plain Flour

Vegetable stock (1/4 - 1/2 pint depending on how thick you like it) ( or Beef if you prefer)

Garlic

Tomato puree

Worcestershire Sauce

Method

Chop the onions  

Fry the chopped onion until soft.

Place half the onions in a large bowl with the minced pork, minced liver, breadcrumbs , egg, herbs and seasoning. Put the rest of the onion aside to go in the gravy.

Mix well with your hands.

Flour a surface.

Form the mixture into firm balls about the size of a tennis ball ( excuse the terminology here) and place in a baking dish.

Cook for about 30 minutes at about 180 degrees, turning halfway until cooked through.

Whilst the meatballs are cooking through make the 'gravy'.

Make a base for the gravy by starting with butter and flour then adding the stock with the water. I always use a whisk to make sure of no lumps whatsoever. I then add passata, garlic,herbs, puree, w. sauce, seasoning, the rest of the cooked onion and whatever else you have in the stock cupboard to make it extra tasty! Cook through for a few minutes.

Take the meatballs out of the oven and pour the gravy over the meatballs and return to   the oven for another 20 to 30 minutes until the meatballs have absorbed some of the flavour from the gravy.

Serve with mash or rice and peas.

They freeze beautifully and taste even better second time around! I freeze these once they are totally cooked so they only need to be defrosted and warmed through.

Size of meatballs - never the same!

Ready for cooking.

Done!

And two meals for the freezer.

This is one of the cheapest meat based meals you can make. Minced pork and liver are both cheap and easily available. I turn old bread into breadcrumbs and freeze when I get to the end of loaves of bread so I am never short of breadcrumbs. The rest of the ingredients are stock cupboard basics.

Hope you enjoy them!