Well! I got told off for calling them ‘meatballs’ so I thought okay, meat(less)balls they will be! We’ve made these before but this time switched the recipe up a bit and they were oh so good! I’m not writing too much this week as I’ve been busy working on the new site and hopefully I will repost this over there this week!
I’m sure you’ve all been bombarded with GDPR ( data protection) emails and as I’m moving my site anyway, I thought I’d set it up over there for followers instead of deleting you all here and getting you to re-subscribe! That’s the plan anyway! But my week already really hasn’t gone to plan!!! I’m hoping it will get better as the week goes on, but as you might realise, this post is already late going out!
Less talking, more delicious recipe-ing! Okay, these are bitesize morsels packed with flavour, great in a wrap (errr, we ate them before we took photos of that)! They’re fantastic with pasta and sauce, or with rice as you can see here! They’re great freshly cooked, but delicious cold the next day too – so they’re ideal picnic food (if you’ve the weather and you’re not fasting for Ramadan)! They are a bit time consuming to prepare initially (unless you’re a dicing ninja)! but they are oh so worth it AND as these meat(less) balls are quite ‘meaty’ 😛 they’re great for meat-eaters too! Hurrah! 😀
2 medium slices of bread made into crumbs (gluten free/rye/brown/white)
Salt to taste (I used pink Himalayan)
Black pepper
1 teaspoon Italian herb mix
Pinch of red chili flakes
*3 tablespoons nutritional yeast (optional)
Prepare
Cut the aubergine into very small dice (approximately 0.5mm square). Do the same with the onion, then roughly chop the garlic.
Heat/melt the oil, then add the aubergines and stir for a couple of minutes. They will start to shrink and turn translucent. Add the onion, cook for a further couple of minutes, then add the garlic. Cook until everything is starting to turn golden.
Stir in the breadcrumbs, followed by the salt, pepper, herbs, chili and nutritional yeast (I would definitely recommend adding this).
Stir to combine, then remove from the heat.
Make the mixture into pingpong-ball-sized or smaller balls and leave to rest whilst you prepare them all. You may find it easier to work with damp hands.
Lightly fry the meat(less)balls on all sides (I’d suggest doing in small batches) then move onto a baking tray.
When all the meatballs are cooked, bake in a medium oven for 10-20 minutes.
Enjoy!
Tips & Storage
Delicious hot fresh from the oven – with pasta, rice, vegetables
