Kofta Saniya (Middle Eastern Meatball and Vegetable Casserole)

 

I had a couple of eggplants and different peppers leftover in the fridge that needed using up... here's a great recipe for that sort of thing!

This is a delicious Middle Eastern casserole with spiced meatballs, a variety of roasted peppers and eggplant in olive oil, all baked in a zesty tomato sauce. 

For the meatballs:

- 1 lb medium ground beef

- 1 large bunch parsley, finely chopped

- 2 cloves garlic, minced/grated

- 1/4 red onion, minced or grated

- Salt and black pepper

Mix all of the above together and make gold ball sized meatballs .. now taper each side slightly by flattening it in your hand.  Set aside to marinade until the meat is room temp. 

For the vegetables:

- 1-2 eggplants 

- A variety of peppers - I used the long red and green ones like you see here 

- 1/4 cup olive oil (Goog EVOO from Olive That!) 

- 1 red onion, sliced in rings (set aside for later) 

Slice the eggplant lengthwise or into rounds, salt them lightly and set them flat on a plate for them to release some of their water. 

Clean the peppers out and cut them in thick ring sizes. 

Heat the olive oil in a pan and add the peppers, cook on medium high until they're slightly blistered and wilted/caramelized. 

Add them to a casserole dish. 

Now add the eggplant and sautee on both sides until nice and golden. Set aside. 

(I do this part outdoors!) 

Fire up the grill!! 

Add the koftas to the grill and allow them to get nice and grilled (marks and all) They should be still raw inside, so I use a high temperature and simply brown the outsides. 

Leftover ingredients 

- 1/2 jar pessata (strained tomato) 

 -1 tbsp turkish aleppo red pepper flakes

-3 slices of lemon (washed rind) 

Add the onion rings over the peppers in the casserole dish, and nestle the meatballs (koftas) from the grill nicely over the vegetables. Sprinkle the turkish aleppo red pepper flakes over.  Top with pieces of eggplant. Finish with the strained tomato sauce, pouring it over top, shake the casserole so some of the sauce goes to the bottom and coats everything.  Add slices of lemon to the top (optional!)

Bake at 375 for about 30-40 minutes or until the meatballs are cooked through and all it smells delicious! 

Enjoy with bread or white rice! 

Arabic Summer Spread

Tuna Rice: 

- Basmati rice (1 1/2-2 cups depends on the size of your family) 

- 1 small chopped onion (if you don't like the texture of the onion like some members of my family just throw in a peeled onion bulb in tact and then remove it later)

- 2 cloves of garlic

- 1/2 green pepper finely diced (if you like spice add jalapeno? also crushed red pepper)  

- 1 small can of tomato paste

- 2 cans of tuna (in oil, preferably the kind you find at a middle eastern store, or even a good brand in oil) 

- Stock or water

- Salt & black pepper

- Pinch of allspice and ground clove

- A few dashes of Worcestershire sauce

- A few tbsp oil + oil from the tuna can

Wash and soak rice in advance, at least 30 minutes before cooking, I used tilda basmati.

Fill and boil kettle.

Chop vegetables like onion, green pepper. 

Heat oil in the pot, add vegetables and sautee until translucent, add chopped garlic frying until fragrant, at this point add tomato paste to caramelize and fry in the oil which will remove the raw flavour.

Season with salt (1 tsp per cup of rice, if tuna is salty reduce salt in recipe) 

Add black pepper to taste, and a pinch of both ground allspice and ground clove (if you only have one or the other use it) 

Drain rice and add to pot frying around, be careful not to break the rice grains, the objective here is just to get the oil coating the rice a bit. 

Add enough water (or stock, water is fine here though) to cook the amount of rice you're cooking. 

At this point when it looks all ready for simmering I add in the can of tuna (oil and all), keeping the tuna in tact and just laying it over the top of the rice (do not mix it or it'll flake into small pieces) and then cover and simmer until rice is cooked.

Remove from heat and gently using a spoon turn the rice over bringing the bottom to the top with a large flat spoon being careful not to mush up the tuna but arrange large pieces on top or throughout the rice. You could transfer it and arrange the rice on a platter to cool better.

Garnish with fresh cilantro.

Items on the menu above:

Lamb koftas (ground lamb, thyme, chopped mint, chopped cilantro, mustard, lemon juice, olive oil, salt & black pepper, with a tad bit of egg and breadcrumb to keep it in tact)

Beef tenderloin tikka: beef, olive oil, salt, black pepper, lemon juice, marinade and grill.

Tabouleh salad: Soaked fine bulgar wheat, chopped parsley, cubed tomato, finely diced green onion, olive oil, lemon juice, salt

Grilled peaches: Grill ripe but firm peach halves on grill (flesh side down) for a few minutes to achieve a grilled mark and to caramelize sugars in fruit.  Sprinkle with brown sugar and add a scoop of french vanilla ice cream.

Apricot turnovers:  Roll out store bought frozen puff pastry and cut into squares, add a spoon of apricot jam and fold over into a triangle, egg wash the top and sprinkle with coarse sugar.  Bake at 375 F until puffed and broil a few seconds at the end.   Garnish with fresh apricots in season. 

Eid Al Adha!

As usual when it comes to our family Eid traditions having starbucks after the Eid prayer, two frappachinos here
And a hot mocha espresso with whip for my second youngest sister


Headed over to pick up grandma and to a new Afghani restaurant we tried out this year:

Mango Yogurt drink (lassi, dough) my youngest sister orders every single time!

Delicious beef afghan curry !
Grilled meat platter
More meat!

Salad, and bread, we had rice too of course!

At the very top is a quail south african style biryani we whipped up last weekend after Eid, thanks to my youngest sister Munch n' Crunch for all the great photos covering the holiday.