Test Recipe: Turkey Meatballs

Sunday, January 29, 2012

Test Recipe: Turkey Meatballs

Notes:

Play around with the herb amounts as you wish.
Try it with beef/lamb as alternative to turkey for stronger meat flavour.
Add grated cheese if you like
This goes well with pasta as one would expect!

Ingredients:

(Enough for two dozen medium-sized meatballs)

~500g (Extra Lean) Minced Turkey

1/4 of Red Onion (Minced/Finely Chopped, depends on preference of texture)

3 Cloves of Minced/Finely Chopped Garlic (same as above)

1 Egg

1/2 tsp Cumin Powder

Salt & Pepper

Starch/Flour

Parsley/Basil (I didn't want to buy a whole bunch so just used the blended version)

~1 tsp Oregano
~1 tsp Rosemary
~1 tsp Thyme

Preparation Instructions:

Heat up medium-sized pan with some oil at medium to low heat
Place the garlic and onion and saute it along with dry herbs (oregano, rosemary, thyme)
Add pinch of salt&pepper and saute until onion softens and turns slightly yellowish brown
Place the sauteed garlic/onion into a mixing bowl, then add the minced turkey meat in
Add the remainder of green herbs and cumin powder along with another pinch of salt& pepper
Mix the contents well, then add an egg
If the mixture is too wet (test whether a ball of the mixture will be able to stand firmly by itself), then add some starch/flour and mix again
Repeat 7. until mixture is right dryness
Use your palm to form balls (around 2-3cm width). You don't want it too big because it will be hard to cook later

Cooking Instructions:

After the previous preparation, you can place the meatballs in refrigerator or freezer for future use. I personally cannot finish this all in one meal. They can store it quite a while if you put in freezer.

There are various ways to cook it. You can pan fry it, oven bake it or...even steam if you really are that type of person...

For Oven: (Good for large batch)

Pre-heat to 300 F for baking
Place meatball on oven tray/pan which has aluminium foil with a bit of oil brushed over it (so it doesn't stick)
Place in oven and bake for 15-20mins (depends on size of meatball, add 10mins if frozen)
Turn oven into grill mode for 5-10mins for browning effect
Ready to serve!

For Pan: (not recommended for large meatballs)

Heat up medium-sized pan with some oil at medium heat
Place meatballs and cook for several minutes (don't move it too much but also not let it burn)
Repeat 2. in batched (I find it hard to manage more than 5 meatballs at the same time)
Ready to serve!

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