On top of spaghetti: some meatball facts

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Meatballs anyone? Most people love them!

It’s the traditional start to Sunday dinner in most Italian families, served hot with fresh mozzarella cheese, crisp Italian bread, and fried green peppers (the long ones). Whether they’re fresh out of the pot or just garnishing a bunch of spaghetti, nothing beats a meatball.

Here’s an amazing fact about how to make meatballs: Give ten people the same basic recipe and each batch will turn out different. Go figure …

No one really knows the true origin of the meatball, but in a 2003 article titled “Ask the Chef,” John Piso describes it this way:

“Meatballs originated in an Italian’s kitchen when he discovered that he had a bit of ground meat left over. Hamburger meat was popularized at the beginning of the last century, so it makes sense to assume that meatballs started then, just like the meatloaf. see a nice Italian housewife ready to make a tomato sauce and find some leftover ground beef in her ice box a. Always with eggs, parsley, garlic, cheese, and stale bread, it must have felt a lightning bolt that hit her with this idea. Ground beef, garlic, cheese, breadcrumbs, parsley and a little beaten egg to hold it all together. Fry it in oil, toss it in the sauce and Bingo! Two dishes in one pot – pure awesomeness! “

The “Christopher Columbus” question about meatballs is … Why are meatballs round?

The answer: meatballs aren’t always round. In Italy, meatballs are called polpette and are oval. Polpettes are also often served with tomato sauce.

In reality, if the meatballs were flat, they would be hamburgers and would break in tomato sauce. The size of the hand is also a factor. Big hand, big meatball, small hand, small meatball.

Wikipedia, The Free Online Encyclopedia, describes a meatball as “a generally spherical mass of minced meat and other ingredients, such as bread or breadcrumbs, minced onion, various spices, or eggs, usually fried in a pan or baked in an oven. Except shaped and size (there is usually more than one meatball per serving), meatballs are very similar to meatloaf. “

That may be half true. A meatball is only similar to a meatloaf because of the ingredients that bring it together. Meatloaf is a traditional American dish, made in the shape of a loaf, sometimes stuffed, sliced, and topped with brown sauce. A meatball is the stuff dreams are made of because there’s a nostagia factor attached to it: many remember sleeping late on Sunday morning and waking up to the most delicious smell and sound in the world: meatballs sizzling in a pot. pan. It’s always so hard to resist grabbing one. I can’t get that feeling from a meatloaf!

Is a meatball by another name still a meatball? The answer is Yes, because one ingredient remains constant: ground beef. Ancient Roman cookbook author Apicius included many meatball-type recipes:

o Albanian fried meatballs include feta cheese.

o Danish meatballs are known as frikadeller and are usually fried and are usually made from pork.

o In Germany the dumplings are called Frikadellen (in the north) or Buletten (in the east) or Fleischpflanzerl or Fleischkuumlchle if you are in the south

o In Greece, the meatballs are called ‘keffas’ and generally include in the mix onions and mint leaves.

o In Italy, the meatballs are known as polpette. Outside of Italy, they are commonly served with spaghetti as in “spaghetti and meatballs”.

o Japanese hamburger fillet hanbagu is based on similar ingredients.

o In Norway, the meatballs are called kjoslashttkaker (“meat pies”) and resemble Danish frikadeller, but are generally made with ground meat. The dish is traditionally served with boiled potatoes, gravy, lingonberry jam, and / or stewed peas. Some people also like to add fried / caramelized onion to the side.

o Swede (Swedish meatballs) is made with ground beef or a mixture of ground beef and pork, mixed with milk-soaked breadcrumbs and finely chopped onions. They are seasoned with white pepper and salt. Swedish meatballs are traditionally served with gravy, boiled potatoes, lingonberry jam, and fresh pickled cucumber. (In the Babylon 5 TV show all the alien races have Swedish meatballs, albeit with different names)

o Turkish cuisine has more than 80 types of meatballs (koumlfte), most of which are made in the region.

The meatball is so beloved that we even sing about it. Take a look at Tom Glazer’s American classic “On Top of Spaghetti” featuring a wayward meatball. For decades he had a children’s choir singing lines like:

On top of spaghetti all covered with cheese.

I lost my poor meatball when someone sneezed.

Rolled off the table, rolled on the floor,

And then my poor meatball rolled out the door.

Rolled through the garden and under a bush,

And then my poor meatball was just mush.

The porridge was as tasty as it could be,

And early the following summer it grew into a tree.

The tree was all covered in beautiful moss.

Grew up great meatballs and tomato sauce.

So if you eat cheese covered spaghetti,

Hold your meatball and never sneeze.

One last thing … It’s not very nice to call someone “Meatball”. The American heritage; Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition defines calling someone a meatball the same as calling them boring or stupid. So if you must use the mention of food in your name-calling efforts, I suggest you call them “Meatloaf!”

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