Recipe for Middle-Eastern style Polpettine with Houmous
Very simple (takes about 15 minutes all in) but you do need to get everything out and ready before you start cooking.
For the meatballs
250g organic lamb mince
1 clove garlic, crushed
1 tablespoon sultanas
1 teaspoon dried mint (1 tablespoon fresh mint)
1 medium egg
Freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil to fry
To serve
2 floury, flat tortilla
1 tablespoon pinenuts
3 tablespoons houmous (approximately)
2 handfuls of rocket
Optional
lemon juice and olive oil to drizzle over at the end
Before you start put your plates somewhere warm like under the grill or in a bowl of hot water.
In a small frying pan, heat the pinenuts until they start to turn golden then put to one side.
Put the meatball ingredients (lamb, sultanas, garlic, mint, egg, pepper) together in a bowl and mix together with your hands. Use a teaspoon to make about 10 roughly ball shaped patties. It doesn’t matter if they seem a bit too soggy and collapse a bit, they don’t need to be neat (see mine).
Heat about a tablespoon of olive oil in the small frying pan and add the polpettine. Leave them alone for a couple of minutes – the less you fiddle with them the more they will develop the right golden crispy bits. When they have started to colour most of the way up the sides turn them over and cook until golden on both sides.
Put the tortilla on the warm plates (you can given them 30 secs in the microwave if you have one but cold works fine). Slather over the houmous and a generous handful of rocket. Place the meatballs vaguely evenly spaced and sprinkle over the toasted pinenuts. If you want to drizzle over some olive oil and/or lemon juice. Serve very quickly before the meatballs get cold!