In the kitchen

Or what's been cooking this week

With winter days upon us here in the Southern Hemisphere, it is time to make food to combat wet and grey days. I wrote about making these meatballs on my blog, Thistles and Kiwis, as part of the cookbook challenge hosted by Brookford Kitchen Diaries. These spiced meatballs or polpettine piccanti come from Skye McAlpine’s A Table in Venice. The recipe is adapted from one the author found in a book about Jewish culture in Venice. Described as a comforting dish, it seemed the right thing for this chilly winter season. The meatball mixture is based around beef mince, with breadcrumbs, onion, garlic, rosemary, cumin and coriander. I used dried rosemary in the meatballs and added a sprig to the sauce. The sauce is made with garlic, passata, chilli flakes, and seasoning. It was just the thing for a winter weekend.

On Tuesday, I made turkey rissoles or burgers or whatever you want to call them. I served them with a yoghurt/pesto dip, oven chips and broccoli. A great, quick after work meal.

Wednesday was pea soup with bacon and veggies and Thursday pasta with tuna (anchovies, capers and lemon were also in there). It was our usual schnitzel on Friday from our local butcher, with a potato kumara mash and roasted kale. Saturday saw us enjoying for the second time Diana Henry’s Baked Sausages with Apples, Onions and Cider from Salt Sugar Smoke. We had left over veggies this time - the photo below is from an earlier iteration.

Today is lamb curry day, as usual inspired by Madhur Jaffrey’s 1982 Indian Cookery, that was based on the BBC series of the same name. How many of us first delved into this world using her book?

What did you cook and eat this week?