Friday, November 2, 2012

Why it's so hard to food blog... or... how to make meatballs

Food blogging is hard for me, because though I love food and cooking, and I think about food and cooking almost constantly, I have a hard time capturing my favorite meals into recipes.  I just don't keep track of what I make and how I make it in an organized way, despite the meal-planning and food blogging and Pinterest and whatnot.  Recently on several occasions I've scrabbled around looking for a recipe I made awhile ago, trying to recreate something that was AWESOME, but that now I can't figure out how I made.  That particular lemon cake I made for a friend's birthday last year?  Yeah, he'd love to have it again.  But I have no earthly clue which one it was.

And at least lemon cake is a recipe!  I've had people ask me how to make my favorite things and I have not so much a recipe as a general description of things I do and things you could put in if you feel like it.  It's not super helpful, and I often forget important steps and some ingredients.

Even when I'm setting out to blog a recipe and trying hard to keep track of everything I do and put in, I forget things, forget to take pictures of the steps or the finished product, etc.

For example: Meatballs and Caramelized Onion Gravy
A sort-of recipe

Nouns:
Ground turkey- one package, I don't know how much that is.  But, you know, a package of ground turkey.
An egg or two
breadcrumbs or oats-- a cup maybe?  Less than that, probably?
half an onion, diced, or a whole onion if you want
half an onion, sliced thinly
chicken broth
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp flour
Worcestershire sauce
ketchup
garlic


Verbs- gently squish the ground turkey, crumbs and onion together, add in some diced garlic if you remember.  Add one egg and a dash or two of Worchestershire and ketchup.  If it seems to be not holding together well enough, add another egg.  Don't overmix, be gentle.

Set up your stove thusly: bowl of raw meatball mix stuff on counter next to frying pan. Frying pan on medium heat with some oil in it.  On the other burner, a large high-sided pan like a dutch oven or big saucepan, with the sliced onion caramelizing in it.

Now you're ready to make meatballs!  Form the meaty stuff into balls... I make them them an inch and a half to two inches in diameter.  Gently compress the mixture into the ball shape and saute it in the oil in the frying pan, turning very gently so that all sides are browned.  You have to do this in batches, because you don't want to crowd the frying pan.  When your first batch is done, you can transfer it to the other pot with the caramelized onions.  But FIRST, pour in enough chicken broth to come close to covering the meatballs, and turn the pot to a simmer.  Add the meatballs gently.  Keep frying your meatballs to brown them, adding oil as necessary to the pan to keep them from sticking.  Once all the meatballs are transferred to the simmering broth, add more broth to cover.  Simmer for a while... depending on how long it took you to make the meatballs and get them all fried.  Make sure they are all cooked through, obviously.  Then, microwave the butter and flour together until all the butter is melted through and the flour has turned golden brown.  90 seconds should be more than plenty.  Add that mixture to the broth and gently stir to thicken.

Meatballs and gravy are great over mashed potatoes, egg noodles, rice pilaf... anything you please.  Yummmm.

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