Köttbullar

Ingredients

• Minced beef400 g
• Minced pork200 g
• White bread — crusts removed60 g
• Cream300 ml
• Onion — very finely chopped1
• Egg1
• Ground allspice½ tsp
• Beef stock300 ml
• Plain flour2 tbsp
• Soy sauce1 tsp
• Butter60 g
• Lingonberry jamto taste
• Salt and pepperto taste

Salt and spices grow more slowly than the rest: doubling a dish does not double the pepper.

Weight converts to ounces and volume to cups. Grams of flour are not turned into cups, because that depends on how tightly it is packed.

Method

1. 1

   Soak the bread in a hundred millilitres of the cream for ten minutes and mash it to a paste.

   10 min

2. 2

   Fry the onion in butter until soft and cool it completely: warm onion starts cooking the meat.

   10 min

3. 3

   Mix both minces with the panade, onion, egg, allspice and salt, and work it for five minutes until tacky.

   6 min

4. 4

   Roll walnut-sized balls with wet hands and fry them in butter in batches, shaking the pan so they roll and colour evenly.

   15 min

5. 5

   In the same pan whisk the flour into the remaining fat, pour in the stock and the rest of the cream, add the soy and cook five minutes to a sauce.

   6 min

6. 6

   Return the meatballs to the sauce and warm them through for five minutes. Serve with mashed potato, lingonberry and pickled cucumber.

   6 min

About the dish

The panade — bread soaked in cream — is not filler for economy but a way of holding moisture. The bread starch binds the juice that would otherwise leave in the pan, and the meatballs stay soft even the next day.

The mixture is worked for a long time, until it turns tacky. The proteins have to bind to each other, or the balls fall apart in the pan.

The lingonberry is a necessity rather than a garnish. Its acidity cuts the rich cream sauce the way cranberry works against turkey.

Worth knowing

• — Soy sauce in a Swedish gravy is not exotic but standard practice: it supplies colour and umami without a long reduction.
• — Chill the mixture for half an hour before shaping: cold, it rolls more evenly and sticks less.
• — Fried meatballs freeze well. Make the sauce fresh; it takes five minutes.

Nutrition

Per serving at the base yield, calculated from the ingredients rather than measured in a lab.

Calories

690 kcal

Protein

38 g

Fat

48 g

Carbs

24 g

More from Sweden

• Kanelbullar — Cinnamon buns knotted rather than rolled. The cardamom in the dough matters more than the cinnamon inside.