Mondeghili

Milanese meatballs made from meat that has already been cooked once.

Pork, Beef, Egg. Not vegetarian — contains beef, parmesan whose rennet the source does not name, pork.

Ingredients

• 500 g cooked beef, left from a bollito or a braise
• 100 g mortadella
• 120 g stale bread, soaked in milk and squeezed
• 60 g parmesan, grated
• 2 eggs
• a handful of parsley
• nutmeg and lemon zest
• 80 g butter, to fry
• 2 tablespoons olive oil, to fry
• 80 g breadcrumbs, for coating
• 1 teaspoon salt

Method

1. THE MEAT MUST ALREADY BE COOKED. This is a dish for the remains of yesterday's boiled beef, and raw mince gives you a perfectly good meatball that is not this one — the texture comes from meat that has already given up its juices.
2. Mince the cooked beef and the mortadella together, not too finely.
3. Mix with the squeezed bread, parmesan, eggs, parsley, nutmeg, lemon zest and salt.
4. Shape flattened balls, a little smaller than a golf ball, and press them slightly so they sit in the pan.
5. Roll them in breadcrumbs.
6. FRY THEM IN BUTTER, with a spoon of oil to stop it burning, over a medium heat for 8 minutes, turning. Butter not oil: Milan cooks in butter and the browning it gives is part of the flavour.
7. Drain briefly and eat them warm, with lemon.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Italy · All recipes