Not to be missed Danish meatballs

Once upon a time, there was a show on Netflix called Worst Chefs in America, they took 10 or so bad cooks and turned them into amazing cooks. One particular episode they cooked meatballs around the world (perfect for our cooking around the world and geography lessons), which got me thinking, and I looked up some meatballs and found a Danish meatballs recipe to try. This recipe is also where I learned you cannot use a blender when it says food processor (keep reading and you’ll see why).

(I’ve got a few affiliate links in here marked with an *)

Danish meatballs recipe

vaguely based off of this recipe (because let’s face it, I can’t follow a recipe to save my life)

• about 2 pounds of ground beef (first change I made)
• large onion grated (I think we used large amounts of onion powder, now that I have a food processor I’d probably actually grate the onion)
• 1/2 cup breadcrumbs
• 4 tablespoons flour
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg (this would be where it starts being original)
• 2-3 cloves of garlic (I used the pre-minced about a tablespoon or so)
• 1-2 teaspoons of sage
• 1/2 cup milk

Make your Danish meatballs

So, in one of the sets of instructions I printed off they said to add all the ingredients into your food processor and blend it together. Well I had a blender*, and I did that, but a little bit in and we were smelling burning rubber.

Then my blender stopped working.

So, we switched over to mixing it by hand with a potato masher (because we’d kind of burned out the hand mixer* [this is the one I bought after Batman burned out the one I got making bread, yes I am talking about three different hand mixers, I don’t like this one for what we’re doing, but it’s got good reviews], so I bought a potato masher), which the kids thought was quite funny.

Once you’ve got it all mixed together, heat your pan and melt some butter in it. Drop roughly ball-shaped blobs on the pan and cook them rolling them around occasionally to cook all the sides.

I since have been given a food processor for my birthday, and it’s super awesome!

In case you’re wondering I have over the course of my marriage gone through 5 blenders. One a family member broke, one fell off the top of the refrigerator and nearly killed me, one we destroyed with this, another I think died after making baby food, and another I can’t remember what I did to it. For obvious reasons I don’t spend too much on them. Maybe they’d survive longer if I did….

Make your gravy to go over the Danish meatballs

drippings from cooking the meatballs

a little bit of butter

3 tablespoons of flour

1 cup of heavy cream or milk (if you don’t have cream, it’s a 50/50 odds we have it on any given day)

1 tablespoon beef bouillion (which I keep on hand for making french onion soup mix)

salt and pepper

Mix the flour in with the drippings from cooking the meatballs, melt a little butter if you need to. Slowly add in the milk/cream and the beef bouillon.  Let this mixture thicken a little.

We had our meatballs with mashed potatoes, that part may not be how the Danish eat theirs, but it was a big hit with my family. I should actually make them again soon.

Danish meatballs

Print

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes 10 seconds

Total Time 25 minutes 10 seconds

Ingredients

• 2 pounds ground beef
• 1 onion grated or minced
• 1/2 cup breadcrumbs
• 4 tablespoons flour
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
• 2-3 cloves garlic minced
• 1/2 teaspoon ground sage
• 1/4-1/2 cup cream
• butter

Instructions

1. Combine beef, breadcrumbs, flour, eggs, spices, and garlic.
2. Slowly add in the cream, it will be slightly sticky
3. Heat butter in skillet, while butter is heating make meatballs about the same size as a golf ball.
4. Fry the meatballs in the pan over medium heat, as it cooks press down gently with a fork so it resembles a small hamburger patty.
5. After 3-5 minutes flip it over and brown the other side.
6. After the meatballs have all been cooked, add the flour to the drippings to form the gravy and slowly add the cream until it reaches gravy consistency.

Cook your way around the world some more

• Hawaiian meatballs
• Swedish meatballs (the kids weren’t so sure about the sauce)
• Swiss Mac and Cheese