Beef and Broccoli

I was looking for a beef and broccoli with a nice sauce. Most tend to be either over salty or kind of gummy due to too much soy sauce and starch.  I found a nice sauce base start here and then worked it to what I needed/wanted.

Beef and Broccoli

• ginger, grated - about 2 tablespoons
• 4 cloves garlic, pressed/minced
• 1/2 cup hot water
• 1/2 cup soy sauce
• brown sugar - about 2 tablespoons
• ground beef - 1 pound
• broccoli, chopped - about 1 - 1 1/2 cups
• sesame seeds - 1 tablespoon, toasted
• 1 - 2 tablespoons oil/butter
• 1/2 small onion, diced
• 1/2 cup green onion, sliced finely
• 1/4 cup thai basil (optional), chiffonade

1. In a pot, mix ginger, garlic, soy sauce, hot water and sugar.  put it on a back burner on med heat, simmering. 
2. In a large sauce pan, toast the sesame seeds.  Once toasted, place to the side.
3. In the same sauce pan that the sesame seeds were toasted, place the cooking oil/butter to heat.  Once hot, add diced onion to season the oil/butter.  Once the onion is browned, take a slotted spoon and leaving the oil in the pan, place the cooked onion into the sauce. 
4. After all the onion has been moved to the sauce pan.  Add the ground beef to the sauce pan and brown.  
5. Add the broccoli to the sauce pan, cook.
6. While broccoli is cooking, puree the sauce.  Once the broccoli is cooked through, add the pureed sauce.  Mix well.  Add the green onion and thai basil.  

Serve - on rice, noodles or right out of the bowl.  Can add cashews or peanuts as garnish as well for a crunch. 

Tapas : Chicken Albondigas (meatballs)

We had a tapas night the other day and was looking for chicken meatball recipes for those who don't eat beef or pork. I also needed something that didn't have tomatoes or peppers due to allergies of one of the guests. Needless to say it was a bit of a challenge and I couldn't find anything that met my needs exactly. However, I did find a great chicken recipe in a Lonely Planet cookbook called "Spain from the Source" (isbn: 9781760340766) that I used the the sauce for the base of the meatballs and it worked wonderfully!  I would suggest that you check out the book as I did remove all the flour from the recipe, I tend to avoid flour whenever possible.  I don't think I needed it but I did have to change a bit of how the sauce is thickened by blending in the onions because of skipping the flour.

So a bit about the original recipe, Gallina en Pepitoria (Chicken with almonds, saffron & onions)is based on Arabic cooking. Spain had a strong moorish influence and this dish was a favorite of Isabella II in the 19th century. She would visit Casa Ciriaco, a Madrid taberna to eat this dish. Gallina is the name for a older hen versus pollo which is a young chicken. So, to bring out the flavors of the meatball to be similar to a Gallina have a larger portion (or all) of ground leg meat over ground breast meat. My ratio was 70% leg with the rest breast meat but test out what works for you. If you use all leg meat, simmer for a longer period in the sauce, I just didn't have a lot of time which is why I had the breast meat in to bring a bit of "softness" without loosing the flavor.

Gallina En Pepitoria (tapas style)

• 1 - 1/2 pounds ground chicken
• 8 - 8 1/2 fl oz white wine (dry & a bit sweet)
• 8 - 8 1/2 fl oz water (make sure to use same amount as wine)
• 1/2 cup chicken stock
• 6 cloves garlic, sliced
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 cup fresh parsley, chopped
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 oz ground almonds
• saffron, pinch
• 1 onion, sliced
• salt

1. In a large bowl, take the ground chicken, minced garlic, 1/4 cup parsley.  Mix and make meatballs, bite sized (about 2 teaspoons or a tablespoon of meat)
2. In a saucepan, put the wine, water, chicken stock, bayleaf, sliced garlic,  1/4 cup parsley, ground almonds, saffron - bring to boil and let simmer on a back burner. 
3. In a fry pan, take a bit of butter or olive oil and fry up the onion so it is lightly browned.  Add to sauce pan. 
4. Using same fry pan, add butter/oil as needed and start browning up and cooking the meatballs.
5. set meatballs to the side until all done. 
6. Take the sauce, pul out the bayleaf.  Blend to a nice uniform sauce.  It should be a nice saucy consistency.  Taste for salt and add to taste. 
7. Put meatballs and sauce together.  garnish with the rest of the parsley.