Saturday, January 8, 2011

Recipe: Mediterranean Chicken Balls!

The free-range chicken mince that my supplier sells is, without exception, too low in fat to really produce my chunky chicken burgers with an adequate moisture level.  I have been toying with ways around this - adding fat simply renders out during cooking, extra egg tends to escape as well, and adding coconut or almond flour changes the taste too much. The solution? More (finely processed) veggies!

Ingredients (four servings):

500g ground chicken
3 or 4 eggs
5 spring onions
1/2 red capsicum (bell pepper)
1 tomato
10 asparagus spears
1 cup shredded cabbage
Optional: fennel (out of season here), bacon, a handful of basil, thyme, or lemon sage, a splash of lime juice, paprika, salt & pepper as desired.


Method:

1.  Preheat oven (or grill) to 150 deg C. If using an oven, line a baking tray or two with baking paper.

2. Prepare your veggies by washing and then processing with a food processor. You could also chop them extremely finely, if you have the will and elbow grease!


3. Combine veggies with eggs and meat in a large bowl, and stir until thoroughly combined.

4.  Grabbing small handful of mixture, roll into balls (or grab larger handfuls if you want to make patties/burgers, especially if grilling).


5. Place in oven/grill and cook until the centre of the ball/patty is thoroughly cooked. This took about 5 minutes on my grill, and 20 minutes in the oven.


Serve as is, or in a lettuce leaf, topped with cheese or tomato chutney, etc. Sorry for the lack of finished-product photo - we were too hungry to wait!

7 comments:

praguestepchild said...

I've been making something similar for quite a while from an old Thai cookbook I have, but cooked in boiling water (when they float they are done).

It's something of a production so I usually make a lot, and boiling water is an easy way to cook them assembly line fashion.

I'll typically reheat them in oil to add some crunchiness but they are pretty good as is.

Anne H said...

made me hungry just thinking about it!

Darc said...

Looks yummy. I suspect the mixture would be great as a meatloaf too,just add the extra cooking time. I'll try this one soon.

PaleoGarden said...

Thanks for a great 2010. I tried many of your recipes throughout the year when cooking for my family.

Great pictures. Looking forward to 2011. Be well, and have a great summer, it's colder here!

Brahnamin said...

I am just in love with the fact that you have just as many optional ingredients and necessary ingredients. ;-)

Jezwyn said...

Thanks guys! They were fantastic the next day as well.

Brahnamin - ;) The listed ingredients represent what I used, whilst the optional ingredients detail what I would have added if there were any on hand. :)

Dom said...

These look great, gonna have to try them out!