My Food Revolution

A lot people make New Years resolutions, though I have never really been a part of the ritual. It's not that I think it is a bad thing; I just haven't really cared to participate. This year, I decided to make a few resolutions, of sorts, and drag Daniel through them right along with me. No, am not posting on the wrong blog. Both resolutions are food related. What are they you ask? Well, let's find out!

My 2012 Food Revolution (sounds much cooler than my 2012 New Years resolutions):

1. Eat more natural.
Most people make goals to eat healthier...honestly, I don't feel like I need to make that goal. I've been studying nutrition for a few semesters, and I feel like I do a decent job. My goal is simply to eat more natural foods. Less preservatives, less food additives, less artificial sweeteners, less refined grains.

Pre-made natural foods can be expensive, and we are pretty poor, so what this means is that I will making a lot of things. I've already made my own bread, tortillas, pizza dough, hamburger buns, cocoa mix and croutons. Some things I will need to make on a semi-regular basis, others will last for awhile. My next venture is to make my own salad dressings. Cool ones, not just oil and vinegar.

This goal will directly influence this blog. Making more things=More recipes.

2. Expand my restaurant horizons.
Daniel and I don't eat out all that often, but when we do, we always end up at the same places. So boring! In an attempt to explore what is out there, I decided that any time we are going to go out to eat this year, we can't go to a chain restaurant, with the following exceptions:

• It is a restaurant we have never tried before. 
• Someone else invites us to go somewhere with them (especially if they are paying).
• I have ruined dinner and we need a quick meal. (This happens when you experiment a lot)
• We are in a mall food court/similar food restricted area.
• If we do end up in a chain/somewhere we have been, we have to order something we have never ordered before.

I'm excited to find new places and try new dishes. Sure, this may help make me even more of a food snob (I really am one, poor Daniel will never get to eat Shepard's pie in our house), but it will get us to explore new things.

This goal COULD directly influence this blog. If you, (the readers) want I can do posts about awesome new restaurants I find through this adventure. Sure, they wouldn't be recipes, but it would still be directing the tasteful people to tasty food. Let me know. Take the poll!...and then tell me why in the comments. Comments make bloggers happy.

Sweet and Spicy Cranberry Meatballs

'Tis the season for fresh cranberries. (No, they aren't just for Thanksgiving). I saw a ton of bags of fresh cranberries when I went grocery shopping last week. I picked one and hoped to find something fun to do with them. I love traditional cranberry sauce, but I wanted something more. The other day it came to me, cranberry meatballs. I tried my hand at them a few days ago. I was a bit worried since I haven't used my oven much yet (We are in a new apartment, yay!), but they seemed to turn out quite well AND I have pictures! Let's go!

Ingredients:

For the meatballs:
1 lb ground beef (mine was 80/20, I don't made moisture guarantees for less fatty meat, but I'm not against it by any means).
1/2 cup fresh cranberries
1/2 cup dry bread crumbs
1 egg
1 TBS Worcestershire sauce
1 TBS Dijon mustard
1 1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp garlic salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1/4 tsp ginger

For the sauce
2 cups fresh cranberries
1 1/2 cups water
1/2 cup sugar
The juice of one clementine (or a couple teaspoons of orange juice)
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ginger
1/4-1/2 tsp red pepper (depending on your spice tolerance)

To get started, chop your cranberries (the 1/2 cup for the meatballs) really fine. I used a handy little food chopper, a food processor would work great...I just don't have one.

Making meatballs is really pretty easy, but you are going to have to get a little messy. After your cranberries are chopped, mix them, and the rest of the meatball ingredients in a large bowl, using your hands. There is really no other way. Mix until every thing is well incorporated. Next get ready to roll and cook your meatballs. You are going to need a greased cookie sheet, and an Oven heated to 350 degrees. You can prepare before you start mixing meat, or after if you wash hands, or not at all if you make someone else do it.

It's time to get rolling! I rolled my mix into twelve meatballs, which, according to Daniel, had a 1 3/4 inch diameter.

I looked pained, but I'm not.

Making the meatballs.

Meatballs ready for the oven.

Once your meatballs are all rolled out, stick them in your preheated oven, for 20 minutes, glazing them with the cranberry sauce, which I will tell you how to make next, halfway through cooking.

Half-baked and glazed.

Making the cranberry sauce is pretty much a standard cranberry sauce making procedure. If you make it for Thanksgiving, this process will seem quite familiar to you.

Put the cranberries, water and sugar in medium pan over medium high heat. Pretty soon the berries will begin to pop.

Starting to pop.

After the cranberries start to pop, the sauce is going to start to thicken. Before it thickens too much, add the remaining sauce ingredients.

About the stage you want to add the rest of the ingredients.

Cook a few more minutes until the sauce is to a desirable consistency. Mine looked like this:

This should all be able to be accomplished while the meatballs are in the oven. If it isn't done in the first 10 minutes, that's okay, you don't need to glaze with fully thickened sauce.

Once the meatballs come out of the oven,

Put them on a plate, top with the cranberry sauce,

and serve with your favorite sides.

I didn't go to crazy with my sides (leftover spaghetti noodles tossed with sesame oil and garlic salt, and frozen vegetables), because still had to clean up.

I think I broke in my kitchen.

I was really please with the consistency of these meatballs, which I have had a problem with in the past. I didn't soak my breadcrumbs this time, no more breadcrumb soaking for me. Feel free to add more red pepper if you want more spice, they are pretty sweet, and the red pepper pop makes it kind of fun.

I have a pretty awesome menu planned for the next few weeks, so hopefully more recipes will emerge,