Not your everyday meatballs these.
Ingredients
For the meatballs
500gm Pork and veal mince
½ cup Baby spinach leaves finely shredded
2 slices Prosciutto finely chopped
Porcini mushrooms (soaked in hot water for 30 minutes) finely chopped
1 small brown Onion finely chopped
1 tablespoon Parsley finely chopped
1 clove Garlic crushed
1 egg lightly beaten
¼ breadcrumbs
For the sauce
Tomato passata
Onion
Eggplant
Manzanilla or kalamata Olives
Pine nuts
Basil
White wine
Lasagnette
Fresh parmesan
Method
For the meatballs
Heat some olive oil in a frying pan and sauté the onion and garlic for 3 minutes or until soft. Add the mushrooms,prosciutto and spinach and cook for a further minute. Allow to cool then combine well with mince. Add egg and breadcrumbs and season to taste. Form tablespoons of mixture into balls. Use wet hands to do this and it won’t stick to your hands as much. Heat some more olive oil in the frying pan (use the same one to save on washing up!) and brown the meatballs over a medium high heat. I lift the pan from the heat regularly and swirl it around to move the balls and get an even cooking. They should take about 5 minutes.
For the sauce
Still in the same pan,add a bit more olive oil and sauté the onion until soft. Deglaze the pan with the wine using a spoon to get all the flavour off the bottom of the pan. Add the eggplant and cook for 5 minutes. When the eggplant is beginning to get tender,add the tomato passata and cook for a further 5 minutes. When almost done,return the meatballs,stir through the olives,pinenuts and basil and heat through.
Serve with lasagnette cooked according to the packet instructions. They are 4cm wide ribbons of pasta with rippled edges. Some shavings of fresh parmesan and you are set.
A good wine for this one would be a sangiovese.
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