it's all about meatballs.

I love them.

I've tried and tested loads of different recipes. Anyone who knows me will know I don't really like to follow recipes. I pretend it's because I like my own original ideas but I'm pretty sure it has something to do with my low attention span.

Anyway, I've got mince to use up so on tonight's menu is:

 Homemade spiced meatballs with a tomato and chorizo sauce and fresh pasta.

How I'll be making these beauties...

• Lean steak mince (500g makes about 8 good sized meatballs).
• Pork mince - around 250g.

• 1 large red onion.
• 1 large green onion.
• Garlic puree.
• 2 garlic cloves.
• paprika/black pepper/salt.
• fresh oregano (or dried).
• chilli powder.
• fresh pasta of your choice.

For the sauce:

• 1 tin of italian plum tomatoes (good brand).
• fresh basil (or dried).
• chorizo (as much as you like).
• 1 small chilli.
• 2 teaspoons of tomato puree.
• 1 beef stock cube.
• seasoning.

To make your meatballs...

This is the fun part. Set aside a chopping board and take out both minces and start to mix them together. Pork mince helps to bind the beef mince and also keeps it soft and succulent and not too coarse.

Seasoning is key for the meatballs, nothing worse than bland balls so take a good bit of the beef mince and a pinch of the pork mince and season with oregano, garlic, chilli powder, paprika and salt and pepper. Some people like to add a small amount of egg to bind but I don't find it greatly neccessary with the pork mince. Now the fun part, roll into lovely little balls and repeat until you have a baking tray full of meatballs.

I put them in the oven at about 180 for about 15 minutes as they are and then make the sauce.

To make the sauce...

Good tomato sauces are easy to make and I think they are best kept simple and not over-complicated. Every chef I've ever heard making a tomato sauce has said that if you get a top quality tin of plum tomatoes (make sure they are italian plum tomatoes), it is as good as any fresh for a sauce as they flavours are more concentrated. You will need a blender or a hand-mixer whichever you prefer and as with the beauty of a blender, you can pretty much just pop all the ingrediants in and let it work its magic.

Put the tomatoes and tomato puree in first with a teaspoon of sugar - always do this with tomatoes as it just takes away that bit of tartness all tomatoes have. Then add the herbs, seasoning and 2 teaspoons of garlic puree accordingly and the beef stock. The only important thing is that the chorizo goes it last; sometimes I just like to chop it down really finely and put it in but it's quite nice if you blend it on coarse for around 20 seconds and the juices from the chorizo add a nice depth and smokiness to the sauce.

You could heat up the sauce seperately but what I like to do is pour the sauce over the meatballs and cook for the last 5-7 minutes, this way you get the juices from the meatballs in the sauce too.

Et voila.

Serve over fresh pasta, season with black pepper and sprinkle on parmesan. Delicious.

Will try and upload a picture later.

Any questions/ideas to @candiloveslove #meatballs.

mwah. xo