Recipes
Meatballs with Green Olives
Fried foods are the tradition for Chanukah and so in keeping with this, I have fried the meatballs. Served with a tasty green olive and tomato sauce, they make a delicious family meal.
Green olives are picked before ripening whereas black olives are picked when ripe. And because raw olives are mostly inedible, the green olives in particular undergo some form of curing process brined, pickled or soaked in oil.
Any olive will ultimately grow softer in brine. Generally green olives are denser, firmer and more bitter than black olives.
Preparation Time: 20 minutes
Cooking Time: 40 minutes
Serves: 6 people
Ingredients:
1 kg minced beef
4 cloves garlic- peeled and finely chopped
2 tablespoons breadcrumbs
1 egg
1 tablespoon dried coriander
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Rapeseed oil or vegetable oil – to fry meatballs
For the Sauce
200g green olives – pitted
1 large onion – peeled and finely chopped
50 ml white wine
750g tomatoes – skinned, deseeded and chopped or 2 tins 400g chopped tomatoes
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Garnish: 6 cherry tomatoes – roughly chopped
~sprigs of fresh coriander
Method
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Combine minced meat with garlic, bread crumbs, coriander and cumin seeds, salt and pepper and mix well.
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Shape into cocktail size meatballs.
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Heat the oil in a large frying pan until it is hot. Sauté on both sides until slightly brown. Remove from the pan and set aside.
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In the meatball frying pan, sauté the onion and the olives for 5 minutes. Stir in the wine, tomatoes, salt and pepper and simmer for 10 minutes.
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Add the meatballs and cook for covered for a final 10 minutes.
Serve with rice spiked with chopped coriander and dried coriander and garnish with chopped cherry tomatoes.
