Fray Bentos Meatballs

Following the spectacular popularity of my last Fray Bentos adventure I thought I would give another stable-mate the myfoodeeblog treatment. Here ladies and gentlemen, are some tasty meatballs!

So, what’s inside the tin?

Erm, uhooee, ergh, un, uuh erugh, gah, euuugh ergh uh ergghgh

Eating cold meatballs straight out the tin isn’t something I would recommend. The meatballs taste pretty bland but it’s the texture and colour that gets you: slimy and grey. OTOH the sauce is palatable and tastes a bit like tomato soup, which isn’t surprising given that it’s an erm, tomato sauce.

So, what am I going to do with these meatballs?

After not much thought I reckon the meatballs will work as part of a yoghurt based Korma because the acid in the yoghurt should really cut through the slime of the ‘balls.

I start by dry roasting black onion seeds, cumin, fennel seeds, cardamom:

And I blend these so that I have a basic spice mix

Next up I will finely chop some giner, garlic and half an onion:

All these ingredients are added with some water to a pan and they are cooked through for the next 45 minutes (this is very important as it forms the base of your korma)

So once this has been done I add some meatballs, 2 tblsp yoghurt and some of the base to a frying pan:

Over the next 10 minutes I will add another 2 tblsp of yoghurt every 2 mins or so till I have added about 400mls (2 small cartons FYI). I don’t know why I can’t just add it all at once but the cook book says NO!

I finish the dish by stirring through some cream, blanched green beans and some fresh corriander. And here we go! Meatball korma!

Sexy as fuck.

But how does it taste?

The korma itself with its creamy, sour-ee, spicey-ness is really nice; it’s rich and tart and tastes legit. Pass. However, the meatballs are just stupid. They have such a rubbish texture and indistinct cheap sausage taste that I pretty much leave them alone and just eat the rice, green beans and sauce. Fail. I don’t know what it is about Fray Bentos and the meat they use. Is it meat? Maybe they have genetically engineered living meat sticks that they grow inside all their factories, which look like a meat version of Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, except they have huge meat trees, lakes of blood, and brain bushes. I can totally see this. Meat trees.

Back to planet Earth…Do you like meatballs? You do? Then why not fire over to the food geek Facebook page, or you could always check the Twitter account or my Huffpost stuff.

PS Next blog post will be Halloween themed and will be up over next few days…And will involve a certain acerbic media personality…