Kibbeh meatballs in pitta bread

Jolly difficult thing to photograph!

I have found, in the last few years, that I really like most Middle Eastern food.  I love lamb - I suspect I'd probably like goat too, but haven't had the opportunity to try any yet - and the flavour combinations of sweet and savoury, plus fruit and meat, seem to be right up my street, too.

I'm not too familiar with this style of cooking yet though.  I'm getting more familiar with Indian, have been pretty familiar with Greek and Italian for some time and Mexican is increasingly featuring on our menu plans.  However, Middle Eastern cuisine is creeping into the menu plan quietly as my confidence grows with it.

Hence, when I saw the recipe for Middle Eastern Kibbeh (Lebanese meatballs) by Maggie Parnell on All Recipes UK, it struck a chord because a) it was a meatball dish and I seem to be tripping over meatball dishes every day, and b) it used all the spices that we were already familiar with.

The recipe for the meatball mixture I was happy enough with, but could see some potential problems with the salad ingredients as they were, so did a little bit of tweaking where that was concerned.

Now is it just me, or does anyone else find that the pitta bread you get from a Supermarket just isn't big enough to hold salad as well as meat?  It seems to me that as soon as you've got a little bit of shredded salad in there, you've no room to put your meatballs (or whatever).  I'm going to have to abandon Supermarket pittas and buy some from our local ethnic shop, I reckon.  Might have half a chance of being able to actually fill them instead of just using the bread as "grand garnish" which falls apart within seconds.

Anyway - that aside - I really liked these meatballs, but agree with hubby that the spicing could have been a lot more obvious in the overall flavour.  The allspice just disappeared, as did the chilli powder.  If a recipe is going to include spices, then I like to be able to taste them!

I really liked the combination of the Bulgar wheat with the lamb in the meatball - but found that the 175g of Bulgar wheat was way too much for the 500g of lamb mince.  Considering that the recipe stated to use 400g of mince, that amount of wheat would have been extraordinarily excessive.  As it was, a third of the Bulgar wheat went into the dogs' dinners (which they were happy about!), to prevent it flooding out the mince.

The original recipe recommended cooking the meatballs on skewers under the grill or on a griddle pan.  Now I could quite see what would happen if I used the griddle pan - we'd have bits of exploded meatball everywhere and no actual balls in sight.  I am always loath to use the grill pan on our cooker for things that are likely to take a long time to cook, as it really doesn't do my back any favours to have to keep bending down to it.  (It's at below worktop height, as opposed to one of those that are above worktop height, you see).  So after due consideration, I reckoned that if I baked the meatballs at around 180-200degC, they would char nicely on the edges and hold together perfectly - as indeed they did.


So, all these points have been reflected in the recipe below and I am quite sure that it will be all the better for it (if not exactly authentic).


The inclusion of some Tzatziki (cucumber yoghurt dip) with the recipe has served to remind me just how much I love that stuff.  It is so easy to make, too, that I shall have to devise some ways of using it along with lunch!  Perhaps a Bulgar wheat/griddled vegetable combo with Tzatziki - hmmn, that sounds ideal.


KIBBEH MEATBALLS IN PITTA BREAD   (serves 3)


Ingredients :


100g Bulgar wheat
350ml hot lamb stock
500g lean minced lamb
1 red onion, grated
50g pine nuts, toasted and roughly chopped
3 tbsp chopped fresh coriander
half a tsp ground allspice
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp chilli powder


To serve :
6 wholemeal pitta breads (if small - otherwise, sufficient to cope with the amount of meatballs)
shredded Little Gem or Iceberg lettuce
cherry tomatoes, sliced fine
mild red chilli pepper, chopped fine
Tzatziki (cucumber yoghurt dip).


Method :


1.  Put the Bulgar wheat into a saucepan and pour over the hot stock.  Cover and leave to stand for 15 minutes.


2.  Remove the lid from the pan and, if necessary, cook the wheat over a low heat to boil off any excess liquid - whilst rendering the grain still moist.  My Bulgar wheat was of the small gauge variety and didn't need this step.


3.  Tip out onto a plate, spread to even thickness and leave to cool.


4.  Once cool, tip the wheat into a bowl and add the lamb, onion, pine nuts, coriander and dry spices.  Season with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.


5.  Then, using your hands, give the whole a good mix - or "squidge" - until every ingredient is evenly distributed.


6.  Divide the lamb mixture into golf-ball sized pieces and shape into balls.  Place each ball into a shallow sided non-stick baking tray.  (I found that the mixture made 18 meatballs which were divided three to a pitta bread).  If you're wanting it to go further, I'd suggest making the meatballs a little smaller.


7.  Bake the meatballs in a hot oven (200degC/400degF/Gas6) for some 35-40 minutes until slightly charred on the outside and very much cooked.  (I always break a meatball in half to check that the inside is cooked through).


8.  While the meatballs are cooking, you can get on with toasting the pitta bread and opening one side, ready to take the shredded salad.  You can also prepare the Tzatziki if you're making it yourself - or just take the lid off.  *chuckle*


9.  Once done, into each pitta bread place some shredded salad, a few slices of tomato and a sprinkling of chilli, then load up your meatballs and finally add a spoonful of Tzatziki.


10.  Serve with disposable napkins - because someone is bound to get it all down their front!


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A busy week - all the more reason to meal plan!

It is indeed a busy week, this week - as might be evidenced by the fact that this meal planning post is appearing on Friday instead of Tuesday!  Oops!

On the reckoning that it's better late than never, here's what is on the menu for this week :

Tues : Chickarone Soup with cheesy pesto dippers

Wed : Pizza Hut for hubby's birthday

Thurs : Hot dogs and potato wedges

Fri : Mango chicken with spiced pilau rice

Sat : Chicken & fennel gratin with salad

Sun : Asparagus & bacon risotto followed by Raspberry Sherry Trifle

Mon : Kibbeh meatballs in pitta bread with salad & potato wedges

Yes, you're right - the Chickarone soup was indeed on last week's meal plan.  To be honest, I forget why it got bounced to this week but we managed to have it on Tuesday evening and very nice it was too.  I've already blogged this recipe, which you can find here if you've missed it.  The cheesy pesto pitta bread dippers were especially nice and worthy of a special mention!

So manly - so "Hubby" :)

Wednesday was hubby's birthday and although I'm afraid it was a very dull and uneventful birthday (for various reasons which I won't go into here) we did manage to go out to our local Pizza Hut for dinner that night.

We were taking advantage of their Happy Hour promotion, which offers either a pizza or pasta dish, a refillable drink, countless trips to the salad bar and a side order of either potato wedges or garlic bread, for £6.  Desserts were additional to the price, but as their ice cream machine had broken down, we didn't indulge but stopped at a drive through Macdonalds and got a McFlurry on the way home!

Photo c/o Pizza Hut

I definitely think I did the best in my choice of the Four cheese Pasta with vegetables, as it was really very nice indeed and looked so much more appealing than the two pizzas that the chaps had!  I love the salad bar and was very happy with my choices of salad items, which were fresh and appetising throughout. The drinks choice (Robinson's Squash) was a let down, as it quite obviously contained Aspartame - which is something of a surprise for such a reputable "name".  The garlic bread was just that - garlic bread.  Not dripping in butter, but tasty and with a crispy crust - so nothing to complain about there.

It wasn't the most earth-shattering birthday meal we'd ever had, but it was hubby's choice and he professed to have enjoyed his pizza meal - which took him back to pizza's of yore, he said.  Maybe next year we'll be able to push the boat out a bit further, you never know.  Well, it wouldn't be difficult, especially considering that boat stayed firmly where it was this time, resisting all attempts to be pushed out in any direction at all.  *sigh*  Hey ho.

Onwards and upwards then.  Or maybe it should be "onwards and straight forwards", as there doesn't appear to be much upward movement going on at the moment.  We have that huge monkey "circumstance" sitting on our backs currently, but as we move on through that circumstance, hopefully there'll be some upward motion!

So, Thursday's chicken dish got bumped in favour of Bockwurst hot dogs.  My motivation got up and left part way through the afternoon and hubby offered to make hot dogs instead.  You must all know that I'm easily swayed by the promise of a Bockwurst, but if you include the additional lures of fried onions and Maille Dijon mustard, then I'll be snapping at the end of that hook in no time at all.

Let me tell you, that Dijon mustard is a nice thing.  Grey's Poupon Dijon mustard is a very nice thing, but Maille Dijon mustard just blows all the rest out of the water, where quality and flavour are concerned.  If you've never tried it and are a bit of a mustard hound like I am, I thoroughly recommend it to you - but in small doses, for your own protection!

I was originally planning to have a variation on a sausage roll for dinner tonight, but now the Mango Chicken has superceded that as we had bought the chicken.  Anyway, I was really looking forward to this recipe, I just ran out of enthusiasm by yesterday afternoon.  It's back today, so we're all set for some chicken breasts stuffed with mango chutney and brushed with a curried oil mixture, oven baked.  With a spiced pilau rice to accompany, it sounds like a lovely comforting dish for a Friday evening.

Saturday's Chicken & Fennel Gratin is, I believe, a Mary Cadogan recipe that I gleaned from a BBC Good Food magazine.  I don't seem to be able to find the recipe online anywhere, but if you know different, do tell me where and I'll link to it!

I liked this recipe as it is really very simple to produce, we love fennel and the gratination will add a lovely light crunchiness to the dish.  It seemed to me to be a perfect combination to eat in this betwixt & between period, as winter draws to a close yet before spring has really sprung.   I had the majority of the ingredients already in stock, just needing to get in the chicken and fennel - which amazingly, the supermarket had today!  Usually whenever I want fennel it isn't there, yet when I don't, there are dozens of the furry topped little green monsters just falling off of the shelf.  Well, two fell into my basket today, so I'm satisfied.

We're having my parents over for lunch on Sunday - being Mother's day - and hubby is going to prepare one of his legendary risotto's.  It's looking like a bacon & asparagus risotto at the moment, but as he is the one developing the recipe, it could be subject to change!  I'm going to make a beautiful old-fashioned raspberry & sherry trifle in the lovely glass bowl that hubby picked up - just for the purpose - for £1.50 in the charity shop.  I can't wait, it's been an absolute aeon since I've had a proper trifle!

I don't know about you, but whenever we are expecting either set of parents to visit, it seems to motivate a week of furious cleaning and sorting out.  As much as I have tried to resist the compunction to do this, it just gets the better of us and we find ourselves stressing over whether the windows are clean enough, or should we wash the curtains?  These days, owing to my being incapable, it's poor old hubby who gets all the jobs to do.  He's been grafting away every day this week - pretty soon, we'll be able to comb our hair in the reflections from the surfaces.  Meanwhile, I sit here typing away whilst trying not to a) get in the way and b) say anything that might imply I'm adding to his taskload!

I'm sure Sunday will be a nice day, as it will be lovely to have my parents over to us for a change.

By Monday, however, I expect hubby may very well be ready for a day off.

Monday's lamb meatball dish should add a bit of Middle Eastern interest to the day.  The mince is mixed with bulgur wheat and pine nuts (amongst other things) and the meatballs are served in a salad stuffed pitta bread, with tzatziki to moisten the whole thing.  Sounds, to me, absolutely delightful and I'm very much looking forward to it.

Now, I STILL haven't made that Dorset Apple Cake, nor the Peanut Butter - although I am harbouring peanut butter making hopes for when I finish with the blog.  You never know!

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