#RealFood For Kids: Low-Carb 'Grannies in Blankets'

This is a new twist on a beloved South African dish: Ouma Onder Die Komberse. Big, juicy meatballs are flavoured with nutmeg, onion and lemon zest, wrapped in soft cabbage ‘blankets’, then baked in a creamy lemon sauce.

The paragraph above comes directly from just-published Real Food: Healthy, Happy Children, by Kath Megaw (Quivertree, 2015), and I'm honoured to have been asked to contribute some of my low-carb recipes to the book.

South African paediatric dietician Kath Megaw is a leading fundi on low-carb and ketogenic diets for children. "Wait!" I hear you cry. "Low carb for kids?" Yes, that's right, but I can assure you that this is not some faddish, irresponsible book leaping onto the banting bandwagon. It's a painstakingly researched, well-informed, sensible guide that advocates a return to real, 'living' food using the wholesome unprocessed ingredients so familiar to our grandparents.

If you're looking to banish sugar, stodge and boxed foods from your family's diet, you've found the only guide you'll ever need, whether you're pregnant, or feeding a baby, or a coping with teens who have hollow legs. If you still need convincing, click here to listen to a podcast of Kath talking about her book, and here to read more about her low-carb philosophy.  

When I first picked up my copy of this hefty 300-page book at last week's launch, I was astonished at how much detailed information is packed between the pages. It's bursting with tips, tricks and accurate nutritional info, with lovely photographs and illustrations adding whimsy along the way. Journalist and cookery writer Daisy Jones, who wrote the text, has a chatty yet precise style, and she's brilliantly conveyed Kath's 20 years of clinical experience in this field.

What's pleased me so much about contributing to this project  is seeing my name on the same line as Phillippa Cheifitz's.  Phillippa, who wrote many of the gorgeous recipes in the book, is one of the grande dames of South African cookery writing, and I have greatly admired her since I cooked my way through her inspiring Cosmopolitan Cookbook in my twenties.

I hauled my tattered, cake-spattered copy of that book to the launch, and my day was complete when Phillippa graciously signed it for me, 29 years after I bought it.

I'm so looking forward to trying the recipes on my own family - specially the mouth-watering treats from the party food section.  (My beloveds feel so deprived of puds these days.)

Nutty Exploding Apples with Vanilla Custard: another of my recipes
from  Real Food: Healthy, Happy Children

Now to the recipe. I've used a Swedish-style creamy sauce to cloak these cabbage-wrapped meatballs, but you could also bake them in a fresh tomato sauce.  Meatballs tend to be a little dense when they don't contain breadcrumbs, but I've found that a big dollop of natural Greek yoghurt helps to tenderise them. This #LCHF recipe is suitable for diabetics.

Low-Carb 'Grannies in Blankets' 

12 outer leaves from a cabbage (or baby savoy leaves)
2 lemons
salt and milled pepper, to taste
1 large onion, peeled
900g beef mince
1 extra-large free-range egg, lightly beaten
2 cloves garlic, peeled and finely grated
3 tbsp thick Greek yoghurt
1½ tsp nutmeg
1 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp white wine vinegar
1 cup cream
4 tbsp finely chopped parsley
butter, for greasing

1. Preheat the oven to 170°C (fan off).
2. Trim away the thick lower ‘ribs’ of the cabbage leaves. Bring a large saucepan of water to a
rolling boil, then add a wedge of lemon and a pinch of salt. Plunge the leaves into the water,
partially cover with a lid and blanch for 7 to 9 minutes, or until the leaves are wilted.
3. Drain (reserving the poaching water), then run the leaves under cold water for 3 minutes and
set aside to drain further.
4. Grate the onion on the fine tooth of a grater to create a soft, juicy pulp. Tip this into a large
mixing bowl and add the mince, egg, garlic, yoghurt, nutmeg and the zest of 1 lemon, plus
seasoning. Combine the mixture well using your hands., then roll the mince into 12 balls, each
about the size of a golf ball.
5. Heat a little olive oil in a non-stick frying pan and brown the meatballs on all sides, in batches,
over a medium-high heat – this should only take a few minutes per side as they should be nicely
caramelised, but still raw on the inside. Set the meatballs aside on a plate.
6. Turn up the heat and add the vinegar, plus half a cup of the cabbage poaching liquid. Let this
mixture bubble vigorously for 3 to 5 minutes, or until it has reduced by half.
7. Remove the pan from the heat, wait a minute, then stir in the cream. Return the pan to a
medium heat and let the sauce bubble for 1 minute, stirring now and then, until it has slightly
thickened. Now stir in the juice of half a lemon and the parsley and set aside.
8. Pat the cabbage leaves very dry on kitchen paper. Tuck a leaf around each meatball and arrange
in a buttered baking dish. Pour the sauce around and over the cabbage parcels and cover the dish
loosely with tin foil. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until the ‘grannies’ are cooked right through.


Serves 4-6 Per serving: energy: 514 kcal protein: 33g fat: 39g carbs: 7g ratio: 1.0 :1

Recipe courtesy of Quivertree Publications. 

More of my meatball recipes:

• No-Carb Lemon Turmeric Meatballs in Lettuce Cups 
• Low-Carb Swedish-Style Meatballs in a Creamy Lemon Sauce
• Meatballs in a Spicy Tomato and Yoghurt Gravy
• Mini Pita Breads with Spicy Meatballs and Hummous
• Quick Oven-Baked Meatballs with Tomato & Spag

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Low-Carb Lemon & Turmeric Meatballs in Lettuce Cups, with a Creamy Tahini Sauce

You can add any spices and aromatics you fancy to these juicy no-carb meatballs. I've included two hefty teaspoons of turmeric (because scientists keep discovering the amazing health benefits of this interesting yellow root) plus lemon zest for zing, and the usual warming spices I love so much -  cumin, coriander and smoked paprika. These are quick and easy to make because there's no arduous peeling, chopping or frying of onions involved, nor any whizzing-up of breadcrumbs.

Lemon & Turmeric Meatballs in Lettuce Cups, with a Creamy Tahini Sauce

Chives add a mild oniony bite, and a few dollops of  Greek yoghurt keep the meatballs nice and soft. If I wasn't on a low-carb regime, I'd serve these heaped over hot couscous perfumed with fresh mint and coriander, or perhaps with my aromatic naartjie couscous or Citrus Couscous Salad.  But I have to say they're also very good in crisp little iceberg lettuce cups piled with chopped cucumber, fresh mint and a creamy tahini sauce.

I particularly love the combination of hot and cold in this dish.  The meatballs must be very hot when you add them to the lettuce cups, and the tahini cream sauce very cold. The sauce is mild, delicate and creamy, containing Greek yoghurt and - something that is so allowed on my diabetic regime - a little cream to round out the flavours. I like tahini, but I often find traditional Mediterranean tahini sauces (basically, sesame-seed paste whisked with water, garlic and lemon juice) thin and somewhat bitter.

The only important watchpoint is to use fresh tahini that is still fairly runny.  Tahini tends to stiffen in the jar as it ages, and it also oxidises quite quickly, even if you've stored it in the fridge. If you can't easily spoon it out of the jar, throw it out and buy a fresh jar.

If you're not a fan of tahini, serve these meatballs with hummous, or tzatziki, or garlicky home-made mayonnaise.

This recipe makes a large quantity - around 48, depending on the size you roll them to.  Put the raw meatballs into a lidded plastic box, and they will keep in the fridge for two days. Alternatively, you can freeze them - still raw - then defrost them overnight in the fridge before frying them. You can make these using beef mince alone, or a combination of pork and mince (I often add ground pork to meatballs because it adds a special juiciness), or even with chicken mince.

Lemon & Turmeric Meatballs in Lettuce Cups, with a Creamy Tahini Sauce

For the meatballs:
1 kg beef mince, or a combination of beef and pork mince; or chicken mince
finely grated zest of a big lemon
4 Tbsp (60 ml) Greek yoghurt
1 large free-range egg, lightly whisked
a bunch of chives, finely snipped (about 5 Tbsp/75 ml)
1 clove garlic, peeled and crushed (or more, to taste)
1 tsp (5 ml) salt
1 tsp (5 ml) coriander powder
1 tsp (5 ml) chilli powder
1 tsp (5 ml) smoked paprika [optional]
2 tsp (10 ml) turmeric
2 tsp (10 ml) cumin
freshly ground black pepper
vegetable oil, for frying

To serve:
tahini cream sauce (see below)
2 iceberg lettuces
1 large English cucumber, finely chopped
a few sprigs of fresh mint

For the tahini cream sauce:
4 tsp (20 ml) fresh tahini
1 cup (250 ml) thick Greek yoghurt
1 clove garlic, peeled and crushed (or more, to taste)
the juice of half a big lemon
3 Tbsp (45 ml) cream
salt and a pinch of white pepper

First make the meatballs. Combine all the ingredients in a  big bowl, and use your hands to squish and squeeze the mixture so everything is very well combined.  Be warned: turmeric can stain your hands! I use thin plastic deli gloves when I'm making these.

To test the seasoning, make a tiny patty with the mixture and fry it in a lick of oil until it's cooked through.  If you think it needs more salt or spiciness, adjust the mixture to your liking.

Roll the mixture into small neat balls, each about the size of a large marble, and arrange them on a big plate or tray. Place them, uncovered, in the fridge for 20-30 minutes to firm up.

Heat the oven to 180 ºC and place a baking sheet or roasting tray in it to heat up.

While the meatballs are chilling, make the tahini cream sauce.  Place all the ingredients in a  bowl and whisk until smooth. If your tahini paste is a little stiff, use a blender to whizz everything together. Tip the sauce into a bowl, cover it with clingfilm and refrigerate.

Arrange the meatballs in a circle in your pan, so
you can flip them over in the order in which
you added them.

Now cook the meatballs. Heat a little sunflower oil in a large frying pan, and when it is hot and shimmering, add eight to ten meatballs.  When I'm frying meatballs, I always arrange them in a circle in the pan so I can flip them over in the order in which I added them.

Fry the meatballs for one or two minutes, or until golden and crusty on the underside, then flip them over and continue to fry for a further two minutes. Lift the meatballs out of the pan, and slide them onto the preheated roasting pan in the oven so they can finish cooking for a further ten minutes or so. Repeat this process with the remaining meatballs.

In the meantime, use a sharp knife to cut out the cores of the iceberg lettuces.  Strip off and discard the outer limp leaves, and remove the inner leaves, each in one piece.  Arrange the lettuce cups on a platter, and add a few tablespoons of chopped cucumber to each one.

Tuck a few hot meatballs into each lettuce cup, drizzle over the cold tahini sauce and top with a sprig of mint.

Makes about 48 meatballs, and serves 6-8. 



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Perfect Padkos: Spicy Frikkadels with a Surprise

Everyone loves a frikkie, or a kofta, or whatever name you give to this delicious, much-loved South African snack. A melting nugget of feta cheese wrapped in fresh mint is the surprise inside these lightly spiced meatballs.

Perfect Padkos: Spicy Frikkadels with a Surprise

Frikkies are a very important component of padkos. This is an Afrikaans word that is impossible to translate, although its literal meaning is 'road food'. But padkos is so much more than just food for the road.  Most often, you'll take padkos in the car with you on a long trip, but you can also use the word to describe any food you'd take to eat on the hoof. Or on a plane, or a train.

I have fond memories of the long train trips I used to take when I was a student at Rhodes University in the early 1980s. The final leg of the journey involved changing trains at Alicedale, a small railway town in the Eastern Cape. The train that used to run between Alicedale and Grahamstown was pulled by an ancient Puffing Billy that toiled so slowly up the hills that you could hop off and jog alongside the train without any fear of being left behind. On one occasion, half starved, having spent all my pocket money the previous day, I was delighted to see the auntie sitting in the seat opposite me hauling out a big, battered polystyrene cooler box. She and her daughter, who both looked like overstuffed sofas in their floral crimplene dresses, carefully unpacked a wonderful assortment of padkos, including chilled grapes, sandwiches, vetkoek, lemonade and big plastic blikkie [box] lined with foil and filled to the brim with juicy-looking frikkadels. Then, without so much as offering me a taste, they methodically demolished the lot, dolefully chewing on their meatballs all the way to Grahamstown, their bovine eyes fixed on a point six inches above my head.

I asked my friends on Twitter to help me define #padkos. The best suggestion, from @NixDodd, was, 'The refreshing victuals packed to sustain travellers on the long South African roads."   Spot on: 'victuals' is an excellent word for describing this sort of food.

And what, I asked Twitter, constitutes proper padkos? There are too many victuals to list here, but the most popular items included hard-boiled eggs (with salt in a twist of foil), egg- or chicken-mayonnaise sandwiches, frikkadels, biltong, cold boerewors, pork sausages, crisps, rusks, samoosas, naartjies, moerkoffie in a flask (preferably sweetened with condensed milk), toffees, sweets and cold chicken drumsticks. All these suggestions were tweeted with great fondness and nostalgia, revealing just how important a part padkos plays in South Africa's culinary heritage.

If you're still not convinced by the idea of cold meatballs, try my special formula (although you may want to leave out the cheese if they're going to be eaten on the road). You can make these with minced lamb, beef, or pork or – best of all – a combination of beef and pork.

Prepare the raw frikkadels up to 12 hours ahead and keep them covered in the fridge. These need to be fried and then finished off in the oven, or they will darken in the pan before they’re cooked right through. The chickpea and spice dusting helps to create a rich golden crust. Chickpea flour is available from health shops and spice shops. But you can, of course, use ordinary flour.

The middles of these frikkies contain a nugget of feta and a mint leaf

Spicy Frikkadels with a Surprise

1 large egg
5 Tbsp (75 ml) natural yoghurt
1 cup (250 ml) fresh white breadcrumbs
750 g minced beef, lamb or pork
1 small onion, peeled and finely grated
2 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
½ cup (125 ml) finely chopped fresh coriander
1 tsp (5 ml) finely grated lemon zest
1½ tsp (7.5 ml) cumin
1 tsp (5 ml) ground coriander
½ tsp (2.5 ml) chilli powder, or more, to taste
1½ tsp (7.5 ml) salt
milled black pepper
100 g feta cheese, cut into 1-cm cubes
a small bunch of fresh mint
sunflower oil, for frying

For the 'crust':
½ cup (125 ml) chickpea (channa) flour
1 tsp (5 ml) turmeric
1 tsp (5 ml) paprika


Whisk the egg and yoghurt in a large mixing bowl, stir in the breadcrumbs and allow to stand for 5 minutes. Now add the mince, onion, garlic, coriander, lemon zest, spices, salt and black pepper to taste. Using your hands, squish everything together to make a fairly firm paste.

To form the meatballs, pinch off a ball the size of a large litchi. Slightly flatten it in the palm of your hand, place a mint leaf on top, and on top of that a cube of feta. Gently squeeze and pinch the mixture to fully enclose the filling then roll it, very gently, between your palms to form a ball. Put them in the fridge for 30 minutes to firm up.

Heat the oven to 180º C. Mix the chickpea flour, turmeric and paprika together a plate and season to taste with salt and pepper. Roll the meatballs, eight at a time, in the seasoned flour and dust off the excess. Fry in hot oil, in batches, for 3-4 minutes, or until crusty and golden brown all over, draining on kitchen paper. Place the meatballs on a baking sheet and roast in the hot oven for 5-7 minutes, or until cooked right through.

Stick a toothpick into each one and serve hot or cold, with Lemon-Yoghurt Dipping Sauce. 

Serves 8 as a snack.

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Book Review: Ramsay's Best Menus, plus I make Gordon's Italian Meatballs

When Aletta Lintvelt, Food24's new food editor, asked me to review a cookbook from Kalahari.net, it took a split second for me to choose the new Ramsay book. I'm a great fan of Gordon Ramsay's, you see, and I wasn't going to pass up the opportunity to cook a dish from his latest book.

I had the chance to see the world's most famous chef in action last year at the Cape Town Good Food and Wine Show (read about this event here, and about why am a Ramsay admirer) and thoroughly enjoyed his presentation. I recall him cooking a sticky chicken dish of some sort at the demo, and that's the first recipe in the book I tried. I didn't like it at all. But more about that later.

Click here to read my review on Food24 and to find out what I thought about Gordon Ramsay's meatballs.
   

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Mini Pita Breads with Spicy Meatballs and Hummous

With the kick-off to the 2010 World Cup less than 39 days away, my home town Cape Town is all abuzz, and South Africa is polishing her biggie boots and laying out the welcome mat for the hundreds of thousands of visitors who'll soon be winging our way. 

Mini Pita Breads with Spicy Meatballs and Hummous

My thoughts have naturally turned to soccer food, and so for the next couple of weeks I'll be focusing on fan fodder: delicious snacks with a South African flavour, ideal for stadium food, or for serving to your mates as you gather round the TV set to enjoy the greatest show on earth. ('What do you mean by soccer food?' snorted my husband when I told him about this project. 'The only soccer food you need is beer.' )

South African cuisine is often dubbed 'rainbow food' because of its myriad cultural influences, but I imagine it as a many-textured crazy-patchwork quilt, stitched together with shining thread that is anchored in the soil and unfurls northwards through Africa to Europe, and west to the Middle East and Asia.

There's no space here to give justice to the diversity of dishes you'll find in South Africa: if you're interested, take a look at Wikipedia's entry on the subject, which is a reasonable (though disappointingly incomplete) summing-up of what we 'Saffers' eat, and why.  Suffice to say that you will find delicious indigenous food in South African villages, towns and cities, and that the culinary heritage of various immigrant communities - from Greece to Ghana, from Mozambique to Malaysia, Nigeria to the Netherlands, India to Israel to Italy - bubbles with great vigour in kitchens all over our country.

So, where to start?

Among South Africa's most beloved snack foods are meatballs, also known as frikkadels or - enchantingly -   'frikkies'. These spicy nuggets are quintessential padkos (this means, literally, 'road food', but is so much more than that) and no car, bus, train or taxi journey is the same without them. The best ones are home-made, always to grandma's secret recipe, and are eaten cold out of a lidded plastic container (known, in Afrikaans, as a blikkie), or from a crumpled nest of tin foil. Finding a decent frikkadel in a shop is not easy: I'd rather chew a gallstone than one of the gnarled, over-peppered bullets produced, for example, by our swankiest food retailer, Woolworths.

Frikkies are easy and inexpensive to make, and are great for feeding a crowd. Here, I've made marble-sized frikkadels, and stuffed them into toasted mini-pita breads with lashings of hummous and some fresh coriander. If you like, you can add a lick of garlicky tzatziki to the inside of each pita bread. If you can't find mini pita breads, cut big ones in half.  And if almost-raw onion isn't your thing, you can fry the onion in a little olive oil before you add it to the mixture, but I just love the crunchy onioniness of these frikkies. My instructions presume that you have such a food processor, or a similar appliance: if you don't, you'll need to chop everything finely by hand (or grate the ingredients).

The dusting of chickpea (channa) flour and turmeric gives the meatballs a lovely golden crust, but you can use ordinary flour instead. The yoghurt helps prevent the meatballs from toughening as they cook.

Mini Pita-Breads with Spicy Meatballs and Hummous

For the meatballs:
3 slices fresh bread, white or brown
a large handful of fresh coriander leaves (125 ml, loosely packed)
1 small onion, peeled and roughly chopped
1 clove garlic, sliced
2 large free-range eggs
4 Tbsp (60 ml) thick natural yoghurt
750 g minced beef (or half-and-half beef and pork)
1½ tsp (7.5 ml) cumin
1 tsp (5 ml) ground coriander
a finely minced green chilli (optional, and to taste)
1½ tsp (7.5 ml) salt
milled black pepper
½ cup (125 ml) chickpea [channa] flour (ordinary flour will do)
1 tsp (5 ml) turmeric
3 Tbsp (45 ml) vegetable oil

To serve:
pita breads (40 mini ones, or 10 big ones)
a tub (about 250 ml) hummous
sprigs of fresh coriander
1 tsp (5 ml) paprika
lemon wedges

Tear up the bread, place the pieces in a food processor fitted with a metal blade and whizz to a fine crumb. Add the fresh coriander and press the pulse button a few times, until the coriander is finely chopped. Tip the mixture into a large mixing bowl and set aside. Now put the chopped onion, garlic, eggs and yoghurt in the food processor and blitz until you have a gritty slush. Tip this mixture into the bowl containing the breadcrumbs and add the minced beef, cumin, coriander, chilli, salt and several generous grinds of the peppermill. Using your hands, squish and squeeze all the ingredients until well combined. Now test the seasoning: take small piece of the mixture, flatten it to a disc and fry it quickly in a lick of oil. Add more salt or spices, if necessary. Once you're satisfied with the taste of your mixture, pinch off pieces the size of a large marble and roll them into balls. Place on plate, cover with clingfilm and put them in the fridge for 30 minutes so they can firm up.

Heat the oven to 100°C. Put the chickpea flour on a plate, season with a little salt and pepper and stir in the turmeric. Heat the oil in a frying pan over a medium-high flame. Dust the meatballs, eight or ten at a time, with the seasoned chickpea flour. Fry the meatballs in batches in the hot oil, turning them often, until they are golden brown and crusty on the outside and cooked through inside. Place the cooked meatballs in the warm oven while you fry the rest.

When you've cooked all the meatballs, heat the pita breads on a baking sheet in the oven. Using a pair of scissors or a sharp knife, cut a 5 mm slice off the top edge of each pita bread. Use a knife blade to open a pocket in the bread (this has to be done while they are piping hot: if you allow them to cool off, they will tear). Add a generous dollop of hummous to each pita, then fill the pocket with a hot meatball. Tuck in a sprig of fresh coriander. Pile into a bowl and serve immediately, with lemon wedges.

Serves 10 as a snack. Makes about 40 marble-sized meatballs. Print Friendly

Meatballs in a Spicy Tomato and Yoghurt Gravy - with toddler variation

About 12 years ago I saw this brilliant recipe - little meatballs simmered in a rich, fragrant gravy - demonstrated on TV. I jotted it down on the back of an envelope, which sat in my recipe file for at least a decade, and then the envelope vanished and I had to make the dish from memory. It's probably changed a bit as a result - and I've added onions and brown breadcrumbs to the meatballs, to make them healthier and more economical - but it's still one of my all-time favourite family meals. I'm sorry I can't recall whose recipe it is, because I'd like to shake her by the hand. I still use her basic formula for family meatballs; it's the yoghurt, I believe, that makes them so tender.

This is a fabulous meal for toddlers, if you omit the onions and coriander from the meatballs and add just a wee hint of spice to both meatballs and gravy. As time goes on and the kids get addicted to the dish, you can increase the amount of spicing in tiny increments so that, by the time they're nine or ten, their palates will be begging for spicy food, and you will have given them the fine gift of a life-long lust for curry!

The original recipe called for lamb, but I usually make it with minced pork, which - if you have the right butcher - is lean, clean and inexpensive. Beef works just as well.

There are lots of ingredients here, but it is quite quick to make if you have a food processor fitted with a strong metal blade. My instructions presume that you have such an appliance: if you don't, you'll need to chop everything finely by hand (or grate the ingredients).

Meatballs in a Spicy Tomato and Yoghurt Gravy

For the meatballs:

3 slices brown bread
a handful of fresh coriander leaves
1 small onion, roughly chopped
2 cloves garlic, peeled
1 kg lean minced pork, lamb or beef
10 ml (2 t) ground cumin
10 ml (2 t) ground coriander
5 ml (1 t) garam masala
a fresh green chilli, finely chopped [entirely optional]
45 ml (3 T) plain white yoghurt
1 egg
salt and freshly ground black pepper

First make the meatballs. Tear up the bread, place in the food processor and whizz to fine breadcrumbs. Add the fresh coriander and pulse until finely chopped. Tip into a large mixing bowl. Put the onion and garlic in the food processor and process until very finely chopped, but not slushy. Tip this mixture into the bowl containing the breadcrumbs, and add all the remaining meatball ingredients. Using your hands, squish and squash the mixture so that it is thoroughly combined. Form into small round balls - bigger than a litchi; smaller than a golf ball - place on large plate, and place in the fridge for 30 minutes to firm up.

For the gravy:

2 T (30 ml) vegetable oil
two onions, very finely chopped
1 thumb-sized piece of ginger, finely grated
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
10 ml ground cumin
5 ml ground coriander
2 cardmom pods
1 stick cinnamon
8 ripe tomatoes, peeled (see note below)
400 ml water
1/2 cup (125 ml) plain white yoghurt
salt and freshly ground black pepper

Heat the oil in a large pot and add the onions. Cook over fairly high heat, stirring often, until they are a rich light brown colour. Add the ginger, the garlic and all the ground and whole spices, and allow to sizzle for two minutes, without allowing the garlic to burn.

In the meantime, roughly chop the tomatoes, put them in the food processor and whizz to a purée. Don't over-process them: you want a slightly textured purée, with not too much foam. Add the tomatoes to the pot and cook over a high heat for five minutes, stirring often. Add the water. Bring to the boil, then turn down the heat and simmer for 30 minutes. Skim off any foam that rises to the top. Now add the yoghurt, a tablespoon at a time, stirring briskly between each addition, to prevent curdling. Season with salt and pepper.

Remove the meatballs from the fridge and place them one by one, using a large metal spoon, into the simmering gravy. Don't be tempted to stir or poke, which will break up the meatballs. It doesn't matter if some of them are sticking up above the gravy line: give the pot a very gentle shake so that the gravy coats each ball. Cover the pot and simmer for 20 minutes. Now take the lid off and give the pot a good shake - the meatballs will have firmed up. Simmer for another 25 minutes, uncovered, or until the gravy is slightly thickened and reduced. Check seasoning and serve hot with rice, plain yoghurt and chopped fresh coriander.

Serves 6 to 8.

Notes:

* Peel the tomatoes by dipping them in boiling water until their skins begin to split. Or halve the tomatoes, press the cut side against the coarse teeth of a grater, and grate vigorously until the empty tomato skin is flattened against your palm.

* You can fry the onions for the meatballs first, if you like, but I love the subtle crunch of onion.

* You can use chopped tinned Italian tomatoes instead of fresh ones if you are in a hurry, but... oh, hell, use fresh tomatoes, or it just won't taste the same. Print Friendly