Little Heavenly Bites Of Goodness!

Sometimes I must say I impress myself. Yeah, I know I said I would be making some Amish recipes and all, but you know there are some days when you crave certain foods. Tonight I was craving spaghetti and meatballs. Spaghetti is by far one of my favorite things to eat, but I don't usually make it because I usually make too much. But I really had to have meatballs. I have a recipe for meatballs that I have developed over the years. I can still remember when I got the basic recipe and what I was doing. When I was in college, a friend and I were really craving some home cooking and so we decided we wanted spaghetti and meatballs for dinner. We knew how to cook spaghetti, but neither one of us were too sure on the meatballs. So I called my mom from my cell phone and asked her how to make them. She gave me a very basic recipe which was basically ground beef, saltine crackers, parsley, salt, and pepper. They turned out alright, but I wanted more. Since then I have played around with this recipe over the years and have come up with a recipe that I truly love. I have decided to share my recipe with the world, if you will, today! There are a lot of ingredients but they truly make a delicious meatball. The nice thing about this recipe is that you can make a lot of them and use what you want and freeze the rest for a quick and easy meal later. I have included a picture of how to prep them for the freezer. The measurements in this recipe are approximate; I never measure when I make these, you may need to adjust to your own taste. Happy meatball eating!


Heavenly Bites of Goodness
1 lb. of ground beef or turkey (tonight I used about 1/2 lb. of each cause it is what I had left)
1 tsp. basil
1 tsp. tarragon
1 tsp. oregano
1 tsp. rosemary
1 tsp. rubbed sage
1 Tb. parsley
1 Tb. fennel seed
1 Tb. Parmesan cheese
1 egg
4-6 Saltine Crackers
2-3 cloves of garlic, minced or pressed
salt and pepper, to taste
olive oil

In a mixing bowl combine all of ingredients except for egg and crackers. Add the egg and then add the crackers until the meat mixture is moist but not super runny or sticky. The best way to combine the ingredients is to put the meat in the bowl and make a pocket in the meat -- add the ingredients and then use your hands to mix the meat up. Once the meat mixture is complete, turn a skillet on low with a little olive oil in the bottom of the pan. Add the meatballs until nicely seared on the outside and cooked fully in the middle. Serve with pasta, on a sandwich, or just eat right out of the pan.



Meatball texture up close:



Many meatballs:



Spaghetti and meatballs:



Meatball prep for freezer:

Meat On A Stick! Does it Get Much Better?

After much deliberation and thought I have finally decided what I am going to blog on for the time being. I don't have a husband and I don't have kids, so I can't really blog about my family. And my personal life isn't usually that exciting enough to blog about -- at least in my opinion. I have decided to start a food blog. Now, this is not a recipe blog -- there are enough of those. This is a blog about my personal experience with trying a new recipe and then eating it and what my thoughts are on it.

I have been in food rut as of late, and so I decided to try some new recipes. Last night I went to the grocery store and bought ingredients for seven recipes I decided to try. All of these recipes come from November 2010's "Everyday With Rachael Ray." So, these are not my own recipes, but these are my own attempts at them.

My first recipe I tried is called Beef Kebabs With Roasted Green Beans and Almonds. This recipe is basically meatballs on sticks, but it is tasty! This is a good recipe for kids. The green beans in this recipe are fresh, so they have to be prepped by breaking off the ends. This would be a good chore for kids, because it will allow them to learn how to prep a food they may only be familiar with in canned form. Fresh green beans are much tastier than canned! These green beans are very tasty too because of the almonds. The almonds are all nice and toasty and give a little extra crunch to the green beans! Yumness! I think kids would also like this recipe because meat tastes better on a stick, and it is very kid friendly that way. Easy to eat! There is fresh parsley in this recipe as well, but dried parsley could easily be substituted. The recipe calls for finely chopped garlic. Chopping garlic, in my opinion, takes a day and a half, so I recommend pressing the garlic. I also think pressing the garlic brings out the flavor more as well.

I had to change a few things. First of all, I don't have a grill -- indoor or out, so I had to use a skillet. Even with my biggest skillet, my skewers were still too long for the pan, so I cut them in half. Works well. If you do use a skillet, make sure you use a little olive oil so the meat doesn't stick.

The recipe called for squeezing lemon juice on the kebabs after they were cooked and a little on the green beans. I tried it both ways. I personally liked everything better without the lemon juice, but if you are one that likes things a little tart, this is a nice addition.

The nice thing about this recipe is that it has provided me three meals. The dinner I just ate, lunch for tomorrow, and a future dinner (Green beans and beef freeze well and thaw well.) This recipe technically serves four, but if you are one person (like me) or just a couple, I would still make the full recipe so you do have leftovers.

So this is my first culinary adventure! Here's to many more culinary adventures!

Green Beans:



Beef Kebabs: