Olympic Food Challenge: Keftah with Harissa Hummus - Algeria

Having competed in 11 Summer Olympic Games, Algeria have won just 14 medals and this year have sent 42 athletes to London to compete in 12 disciplines with a hope of extending that tally.  Historically, their best events have been Boxing and Athletics (specifically middle distance running) but Beijing 2008 saw them collect two medals for Judo so who knows what they'll achieve this year.

Located on the northern coast of Africa between Morocco and Tunisia, Algeria is home to 37m people.  Populated since 10,000BC, Islam was introduced into the country in the 7th century with around 90% of inhabitants now being Muslim.

No, it's not burgers and beans with Sainsbury's pita...

The country gained its independence from France in 1962 and this mix of influences is very apparant in the wide range of dishes attributed to Algerian cuisine.  Dishes vary from region to region and make use of seasonal vegetables.  According to Wikipedia, all meals use grains.  Wikipedia is quite obviously wrong because the recipe I cooked tonight didn't come with grains.  It could've done.  But it didn't.

Geography lesson over, tonight I increased the 'meatball tally' of the Olympic Food Challenge by one meal by choosing to make Keftah.  Like so many countries in the Mediterranean, Algerians have a fondness for highly spiced lamb made into either meatballs or kebab shapes.  I much prefer the term Keftah or Kofte (Turkish) to the very American meat ball.  It's like meat loaf.  Stating the obvious but doesn't sound that appetising.  My favourite term for meatballs is the German Frikadeller, although I've never tried real German ones.

The recipe was once again sourced from t'interweb and I was entertained by its lack of precision.  Put roughly this and a bit of that and a pinch of something else together with enough meat to make three smallish meatballs.  Great for a bit of experimenting.  Meatballs are a popular meal in this house, but if you've read some of my other posts on the subject, you'll know that the husband will only eat Waitrose Aberdeen Angus ones cooked in Rachel Allen's pasta sauce with spaghetti.  This is an advance because before this blog, we didn't eat meatballs in this house so it's one extra meal on the menu.  But he's poo-pooed all the homemade versions that I've tried.

When he found out that Miss A and I were having meatballs, he plastered a pout on his face that would rival Posh Spice.  But once he realised they were lamb rather than beef, he was quite happy to sit down to his boring dinner of plain chicken and plain pasta with cheese.  Until I put my plate on the table.

Algerian flag

'But it's meatballs on baked beans.  I'd really really like that' came the plaintive wail.  Revealing that the beans were actually chickpeas shut him up pretty quickly and let me eat my very yummy meal in relative peace.  As the 'hummus' was so spicy, I didn't give Miss A any, serving her meatballs with pasta and fresh tomato sauce.

I did tinker with the recipe a little because I wasn't a fan of the sauce which was basically water with some Harissa stirred in and then reduced.  So I added some chopped tomatoes, sea salt and sugar to the mix and garnished it with fresh coriander.  Much tastier.  The husband eventually stole one of Miss A's meatballs and you could tell from the look on his face that he actually liked it but wasn't willing to admit to it.  He can stick to his manky shop-bought ones until he retracts his scathing opinion which was based purely on sight.

Served with Khubz also known as Dan Lepard's Perfectly Plain Pita (I adore these and won't ever by shop bought again), it has to be my favourite meal so far and I'll definitely make it again.  First gold medal.

Just as an aside, the Keftah recipe has many similarities to the recipe for Lorraine Pascale's Minted Lamb Burgers (third most popular post on this blog) which I then turned into Moroccan Meatballs the following night.  It's a small world...

Recipe -  Serves 4 (Adapted from Shawna's Food and Recipe Blog)

For the Harissa Hummus

• 1 tbsp Harissa Paste
• 400g tin chickpeas, drained
• 400g tin chopped tomatoes
• 200ml water
• pinch of brown sugar
• pinch of sea salt

For the Keftah

• 400g lean lamb mince
• 1 medium onion, finely diced
• 2 cloves garlic, finely diced
• 1 tbsp fresh mint, finely chopped
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp allspice
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp coriander
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
• 1/4 tsp table salt

• Fresh coriander to garnish

1. Mix the ingredients for the Keftah together in a mixing bowl until well combined.  Divide into twelve even sized pieces, shape into balls and place on a plate.  Rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.
2. Heat a small amount of oil in a frying pan over a medium/low heat.  Place the meatballs in the pan and fry until browned and fully cooked through (I popped mine into the oven on 180c fan for ten minutes, wrapped in foil just to make sure they were fully cooked after frying as they're quite large).
3. While the meatballs are cooking, place the chickpeas in a small saucepan.  Pour in the water, tomatoes, Harissa and simmer over a medium heat for 5 minutes.  Add the salt and sugar and simmer for a further ten minutes until the sauce begins to reduce and thicken.
4. To serve, spoon the hummus onto serving plates and top with three meatballs for each dish.  Garnish with coriander and serve with Khubz (pita) or rice or couscous.

Moroccan Meatballs with Herbed Couscous

Yesterday, I made Lorraine Pascale's Minted Lamb Burgers which were absolutely beautiful.  Having only used up half of the raw mixture, I faced a dilemma because I'd defrosted the mince so couldn't freeze and store any more burgers.  For a while, my analyst brain ran wild - Option a) eat burgers again for tea. Option b) feed them to the dogs Option c) do nothing (I have to put this into every business case I write so it was just habit).  Option d) was to turn them into meatballs.

Still haven't improved my meatball photography skills!

I checked my BBC Good Food Binder and found just such a recipe that I'd bookmarked ages ago.  All I needed was the sauce and the herbed couscous.  In all actuality, I probably could've made the sauce up myself ever since I discovered that the difference between a good tomato sauce and a great tomato sauce is actually a pinch of sugar.  I wish I'd known that years ago.  In fact, the BBC Good Food recipe didn't include this, but I found my sauce to have a bit of a weird tang from the cinnamon.  One small pinch of brown sugar later et voila.  The perfect sauce.

Seeing as how it's Wednesday, the husband was having his usual meal of baked chicken, Uncle Ben's tomato rice and gravy.  When I turned up with meatballs for my dinner, he got all sulky.  But whenever I've mentioned Moroccan food before, I have to listen endlessly about how he spent a month living in Morocco, eating food cooked by a real Moroccan and he didn't like that so anything I might care to cook would be far worse.  I remain astounded that he managed to survive for a whole month.  Do they have Pizza Hut in Morocco??

Anyway, I honestly think he'll like this meal.  Everything was really tasty.  I've written several times before about how I've struggled with finding the perfect homecooked meatballs recipe but I think I've now finally found one he will like (he wouldn't like the Chipotle Meatballs I made back in December as they were spicy).

Recipe - serves four (with generous helpings)

For the meatballs

• 450g lamb mince
• 1 egg
• 50g breadcrumbs
• 2 tsp coriander
• 2 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 garlic clove, finely diced
• 1 large onion, peeled, grated and squeezed to remove as much liquid as possible
• small bunch of fresh mint, finely chopped
• small bunch of fresh coriander, finely chopped
• salt and pepper to taste

1. Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl until well combined.  
2. Divide the mixture into 24 pieces and shape into firm balls (they will feel a little soft but don't disintegrate on cooking).  Refrigerate for thirty minutes to allow them to set a little.
3. Heat a frying pan with a little olive oil and gently fry the meatballs until browned.  Remove with a slotted spoon and set to one side.

For the tomato sauce

• 2x400g tins of chopped tomatoes
• 2 garlic cloves
• 2 tsp cumin
• 2cm root ginger or a generous teaspoon of minced ginger from a jar
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp olive oil
• 200 ml chicken stock
• pinch of soft brown sugar
• salt and pepper to taste

1. In a large saucepan, gently heat the oil then add the garlic, ginger and dried spices and cook for two minutes.
2. Add the chopped tomatoes, stock sugar and season to taste.  Simmer for ten minutes.  Add the meatballs and simmer for a further 20 minutes.
3. Serve over herbed couscous.

Meatballs with Spicy Chipotle Tomato Sauce

There's no two ways about it.  Meatballs are hard to photograph.  Especially when your as pants at photography as I am.  You'd think I'd know a thing or two, being married to award-winning, professional photographer @LCCPhotography.  But all his good advice goes in one ear, hangs around for a day or two and then flutters out the other with a few more memories.

He honestly does despair with me and my lack of skill with a camera.  I want to be good, really I do.  But it's one of those things.  There's no point in competing because I don't have the inherent artistic vision required to take good photos.  I just about remember the rule of thirds.  I've learned to make sure I don't cut appendages off of people (in photos!).  I know that the aperture setting affects the depth of field (although goodness knows what it means).

They're in there...somewhere...

I have a DSLR.  I was getting into using it and then I got pregnant so it's been packed away from small sticky fingers.  He bought me a compact with all the twiddly knobs and a gazillion settings.  I wanted a point-and-shoot because with a toddler, there's no time to faff around and figure out if you want it on aperture or shutter priority.  So I now own a camera that not only has program mode (ie semi automatic) it has intelligent-auto (read numpty) mode.  You point and shoot.  You can turn the flash on or off.

And yet still, it sits on my desk most of the time, out of the way of the detritus littering another evening in the kitchen trying out a new recipe whilst trying not to forget the chicken kiev (shop bought) and garlic bread (also shop bought) that's in the oven for the husband's dinner.  At least we won't have a vampire calling round our house tonight.

So the pictures of tonights recipe were taken on my phone.  People rave about the Samsung Galaxy S2 but having owned an iPhone, quite frankly I don't like it.  The camera sucks.  The shutter is so slow that I often miss the moment with Miss A.  Although sometimes I capture something that I wasn't expecting which can be a bonus.  Pictures with the flash are awful unless you're taking pictures of slumbering toddlers in the pitch black.  And it doesn't have Instagram.  Flickr isn't bad, but it's still not quite as good.

But having tried photographing meatballs before, and failing miserably, I knew I didn't stand much chance on the creativity front tonight.  There's no easy way to get at them if you're serving them in a bowl.  And they're usually under a pile of sauce - which is probably for the best because they're ugly little blighters.

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Ugly little blighters, pre-cooking

So after that rather long-winded excuse for my poor photography, on to the recipe.  I chose this recipe because it uses pork mince.  I'm really not a fan of pork.  I'll eat sausages and I'll eat bacon, but I've never liked pork since I was a kid.  There was just something about fatty roast pork on Sundays and pork chops mid week that still turn my stomach at the thought even today.

The meatballs appealed though as something to try for Miss A (she's having hers tomorrow night).  She refuses meat but will occasionally eat a bite or two of sausage or beef meatball so I'm hoping they're the best of both worlds for her.

The meat - unusually for a lot of meatball recipes I've tried - was beautifully seasoned and tasty.  I think (whispers quietly) that the husband might even eat these without complaining.  The sauce was great to.  It is a combination of passata, onions, garlic and chipotle paste.  The recipe called for a tablespoon of chipotle paste, but rather sensibly, I clocked the 'hot' label on the bottle and only used a teaspoon.  Even that made my eyes water so goodness knows the BBC Good Food team must have asbestos tongues.

I had this with pasta just because that's what the husband was having with his kiev (strange combination, but he likes it) but I think it would have worked better served with rice or some of Dan Lepard's lovely corn oil tortillas.

Another keeper.  (From BBC Good Food Magazine, Jan 2012 issue)

Serves 4

• 
  
• 500g pork mince
• small bunch of coriander - leaves and stalks chopped separately (I used Garden Gourmet coriander paste)
• 2 handfuls fresh breadcrumbs
• 2 medium red onions, 1 quarter finely diced, the rest sliced
• 2tbsp vegetable oil
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• 400ml passata
• 1tbsp chipotle paste (I used 1tsp Discovery Hot Chipotle Paste)

1. In a small bowl, mix together the pork, breadcrumbs, egg,finely chopped onions and the chopped coriander leaves.
2. Season, mix well and shape into small meatballs.
3. Over a medium heat, add 1 tbsp of the oil to a large frying pand and brown the meatballs on all sides, then remove from the pan and set aside.
4. Add the remaining oil, sliced onion, garlic, coriander stems and some salt.  Cook for 5 mins.
5. Add the passata, chipotle paste and 100ml water.  Stir well then simmer for 10 mins before adding the meatballs and cooking for a further 5 mins.
6. Serve with rice or warm tortillas

Meatballs with Tomato Sauce

Yeah, yeah, it's red - not green.  More carbs.  Here comes the justification.

The child doesn't eat much meat.  But she'll eat meatballs hence today's red-not-green carb-filled fiesta.  For now.  I don't hold out much hope that this will be a long-term association but while the going is good, I'm happy to run with it.

*Sings* On top of spaghetti, not covered with cheese...

Being a busy working mum, I succumbed to the lure of the shop-bought meatballs but to be honest, they taste like balls of papier mache, no matter how good the sauce you put them in so I am going to try to find a really good, tasty recipe from somewhere.

I know a lot of people make them with half beef and half pork mince or a beef/veal combo but I only have beef and lamb mince at the mo so have gone with the pure beef option this time.  So I chose a recipe by the lovely Rachel Allen from Saturday kitchen.  I have several of her books somewhere, but can't find them.  Maybe they got lost when we moved from London?  But as they're all about entertaining, and I've not done any in the past five years, it's not a loss that has been too keenly felt so far.

I cheated and made the tomato sauce yesterday afternoon as I just knew that if I left the sauce simmering for thirty minutes while Miss A was still about, some disaster would occur and I'd end up burning the sauce and giving in to the husband's demand for chicken and packet rice (again).

Taste wise, I'm still not convinced these are the tastiest meatballs ever.  The sauce was really tasty (not bland enough for the husband) and so eaten all together, it disguised the lack of taste in the meatballs.  Am now wondering if all meatballs just taste bland and it's the quality of the tomato sauce that goes with them that makes the difference or if I should just use Masterchef quantities of seasoning?  Whilst I love that show, it's another one (like Saturday Kitchen and anything by Nigella) that should carry a warning that watching the programme may just cause your arteries to harden.

The recipe can be found here