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Episode 45

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Published on:

29th Jul 2024

WELCOME TO OUR KITCHEN: We're making meatballs!

Who doesn't love meatballs? Well, maybe Mark, as you'll hear. But we're making meatballs even Mark will eat!

We're Bruce Weinstein & Mark Scarbrough, the authors of three dozen cookbooks and tens of thousands of original recipes. We've been in the food business for almost twenty-five years. This is our podcast about our passions: food and cooking.

Here are the segments for this episode of COOKING WITH BRUCE & MARK:

[00:32] Our one-minute cooking tip: Try roasting white chocolate for a deeper, more caramelized flavor.

[02:48] We’re making meatballs! Here's the recipe:

Start by soaking 1/2 cup or 45 grams FRESH bread crumbs in 1/4 cup or 60 milliliters milk (of any sort) for about 20 minutes in the bowl of a stand mixer or a large bowl you'll use with an electric mixer.

Crumble in 1 pound or 450 grams lean ground beef, 1 pound or 450 grams sweet Italian sausage meat (no casings), 1 large egg, 2 tablespoons dried minced parsley, 2 teaspoons dried oregano, 1/2 teaspoon grated nutmeg, and 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper. Mix at low speed until well and evenly combined.

Clean and dry your hands, then oil them with olive oil. Form the meat mixture into 12 balls, each about the size of a golf ball.

Put them on a lipped baking sheet and roast in a 375F or 190C convection or fan-on oven until brown, turning occasionally, about 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, finely chop 1 small yellow or white onion (peeled), 1 large cubanelle or Italian frying pepper (stemmed and seeded), and 2 medium garlic cloves (peeled).

Warm 3 tablespoons or 45 milliliters of olive oil in a Dutch oven set over medium heat. Add 1 tablespoon chopped FRESH rosemary leaves, 1 1/2 teaspoons fennel seeds, 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes, and 1 teaspoon anchovy paste. Stir until fragrant, then add the chopped vegetables. Cook, stirring often, until softened, about 3 minutes.

Add 1 pound or 450 grams sliced brown button or cremini mushrooms plus 1/2 teaspoon table salt. Cook, stirring often, until the mushrooms give off their moisture and evaporates to a glaze, about 5 minutes.

Add 1/2 cup or 120 milliliters of dry vermouth, dry white wine, dry sherry, or unsweetened apple juice. Scrape up all the brown bits, then pour in one 24 1/2-ounce or 700-gram jar of tomato passata, preferably the Mutti brand. Fill the jar of Mutti with water, swirl it around to get every speck of passata, and pour it into the pot as well.

Bring to a simmer, add the browned meatballs, and reduce the heat to low. Cover and simmer for 1 hour, stirring occasionally but very gently.

To finish off, add 12 torn-up FRESH basil leaves and lots of ground black pepper. Taste for salt and dish it up.

[17:53] What’s making us happy in food this week: Santa Rosa plums and ice cream.

Transcript
Bruce:

Hey, I'm Bruce Weinstein and this is the podcast

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cooking with Bruce and Mark.

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Mark: And I'm Mark Scarborough.

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And together with Bruce, we have

written over three dozen cookbooks.

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This is our podcast about food

and cooking, our passions in life.

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In this episode of the podcast, we've

got a one minute cooking tip about,

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of all things, white chocolate.

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We're going to be making.

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Meatballs during this episode.

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And we'll tell you what's making

us happy in food this week.

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So let's get started.

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Bruce: Our one minute cooking tip.

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Want to be a pastry chef in your own home?

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Try roasting white chocolate.

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What, what, what is

roasted white chocolate?

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When you melt it in the oven

on a sheet pan, it caramelizes.

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It takes about 40 minutes and the sugars

caramelize and it comes out a deep.

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It's almost like making dulce de

leche out of sweetened condensed milk.

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Okay, so just back up.

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So what do you do?

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Take your white chocolate, whether

it's 6 ounces, 8 ounces, 12

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ounces, 2 pounds, whatever it is.

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Chop it up, put it on a baking tray.

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Mark: A lipped baking tray.

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Sure.

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And you know No, not sure.

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No, not sure.

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Bruce: Okay, a lipped baking tray.

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And you're going to place it in

an oven at 250 degrees Fahrenheit.

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And you're going to stir it

around every 5 or 10 minutes.

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It'll take about 40 minutes until

it's all golden and caramelized.

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Then what I like to do is

scrape it onto a piece of paper.

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parchment, spread it out and let it cool.

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Then you could break it up and eat it.

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You could melt it again and use it for

desserts that call for melted chocolate.

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You can pipe it onto things.

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You could dip strawberries into it.

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You can make ganache out of it.

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It's a real.

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big pastry chef.

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Can you then, uh, cool it and break

it up and store it in your pantry?

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You can, you can even mix nuts into that

and make a caramelized white chocolate

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bark, which I think sounds really good.

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Okay,

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Mark: well there you are,

um, roasting white chocolate.

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Before we get on to making

meatballs in this podcast, let me

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say that we do have a newsletter.

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It comes out, I don't know, maybe

twice a month, maybe once a month,

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twice a month, something like that.

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You can sign up for that

newsletter on our website.

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BruceAndMark.

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com or CookingWithBruceAndMark.

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com.

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You can then get our newsletter, which

is unrelated mostly to this podcast.

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And I should also say, if you go

out to our website, BruceAndMark.

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com or CookingWithBruceAndMark.

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com, we started putting up recipes.

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And we're currently on a jag of chocolate

chip or chocolate cookies on Twitter.

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tiktok videos and those recipes

are going up even as we speak.

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Check that out and find out free

recipe content on our website.

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So up next, we're going to make meatballs.

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Bruce: Meatballs are like chicken soup.

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Every cook makes their own version.

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Everyone grows up thinking that the

way their mother or grandmother made

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them is the only way they should be

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Mark: eaten.

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So, I have to make a confession.

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And, um, if you don't know, if you

haven't listened to this podcast enough,

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you don't know that I have an aversion

to, uh, well, what we called loose meat

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growing up, but that is ground beef.

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Or, quote unquote, ground beef.

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hamburger.

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And if you know me, I eat hamburgers,

but I eat them blood rare.

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And mostly I don't like ground beef.

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I know it's this thing.

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And I really don't like meatloaf.

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And I

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Bruce: don't get it.

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I don't understand that meatloaf aversion.

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I could tell you something.

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Mark is going to go visit his

mother in a week and I'm going

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to be alone for four days.

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I plan on making meatloaf.

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Oh, good.

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You

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Mark: eat it all up.

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But here's the thing about,

uh, and, uh, don't even get me

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started on hamburger casseroles.

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Oh, no, but that is loose meat.

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That's

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Bruce: disgusting.

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Mark: Oh, God.

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Oh, I grew up on that stuff.

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Um, anyway, uh, I don't really

like it, but here's the thing.

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I like meatballs.

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And it's a really weird

thing because mostly I don't

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really care for ground beef.

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But, uh, But I love meatballs and I

think it has to do with the browning.

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So we'll get

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Bruce: to that.

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But what I have here is beef and sausage.

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Now, we're going to start already.

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People are going to say, no,

meatballs have to have veal or beef.

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They could be only beef

or only beef and pork.

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In our house, it's a

combination of lean meat.

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Ground beef and fatty

Italian sweet sausage.

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And how much?

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I have a

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Mark: pound of each.

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Okay, so a pound of each.

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And also, we should say that we prefer,

and this is a big controversy in the

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food world, but we have fresh sausages.

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breadcrumbs here.

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So here's what happens.

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Let me tell you way too much about our

lives as I'm staring at these breadcrumbs.

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Uh, the, our dog gets acid reflux.

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I know this is ridiculous to

tell you, but okay, here it is.

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Our colleague gets acid reflux.

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And so in order to stop that from

happening every night before bed,

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he gets half a piece of breadcrumbs.

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toast.

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Um, just literally white

whipped sandwich bread toast.

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He gets half a piece and

that helps calm it all down.

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But we end up with a lot of

crusts from all this white bread.

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So we always have tons of crusts in

the freezer that Bruce can then grind

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up into fresh, not dried breadcrumbs.

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Yes, our dog likes us to cut

the crusts off his bread.

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Don't, please don't write us about that.

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So we have a half a cup

of fresh breadcrumbs.

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And by the way, you can look

for fresh breadcrumbs at most

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supermarkets at this point.

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And we've got them in

a quarter cup of milk.

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It doesn't matter what kind

of milk, whether it's low fat,

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skim, or full fat, or all fat.

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Oat or almond.

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Just no

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Bruce: sweetened, gross.

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And it's been sitting 20 minutes.

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So that's nice and soft.

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Now.

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A lot of people I know were taught

that you lift the bread out and

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you gently squeeze the liquid out.

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No, don't do that.

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It's only a quarter cup and you want

that moisture In to the meatballs.

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And here's the thing, those

breadcrumbs and milk have been

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sitting in the bowl of my stand mixer.

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And that's another thing that

I find is a fabulous tool.

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So we'll talk about that as

we put this stuff in here.

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What we're putting in here is

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Mark: that pound of ground beef and a

pound of fatty, sweet Italian sausage,

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and we're putting it in the stand mixer

with the milk and the breadcrumbs, and

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then we're also adding a large egg.

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Okay, so what do we need to

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Bruce: do before we mix?

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We need to add our spices,

and they're all in here.

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Always the same.

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I keep these the same because

I want my meatballs to be

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consistent every time I make them.

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Two tablespoons dried minced parsley.

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Dried parsley?

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I love dried parsley in this.

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Oh my god, what are you, my grandmother?

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Yep.

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Two teaspoons of oregano, a

teaspoon of salt, and a half a

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teaspoon each of grated nutmeg.

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And a half a teaspoon of pepper.

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Now, see, this is, uh,

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Mark: this is the difference

between the chef and the writer.

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He put dried oregano in

there, but he didn't say dried

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oregano, so I'm gonna add it.

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Dried oregano, but dried parsley?

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Bruce: Yeah, I love dried parsley.

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Okay, I'm turning the mixer

on, I'm letting this go now.

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I love using the stand mixer for

ground beef, And it stems from my

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experience making Chinese Dumplings,

where you're supposed to only mix, maybe

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you don't know this, but when you make

Chinese dumplings, you're supposed to

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mix the meat in one direction only.

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What?

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What?

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What?

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And you keep stirring.

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No, it's true.

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Only in one direction

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Mark: until My physics brain is

speaking loudly right now, and I don't

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have much of a physics brain left.

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And you do that But it's speaking

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Bruce: loudly.

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Until the meat mixture starts to

develop little stringy bits, and they're

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kind of all going in one direction.

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And then You want it to be

pasty with stringy bits.

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Look, that's what I learned.

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I learned it from the internet.

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And it's true.

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I

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Mark: learned it from the

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Bruce: internet.

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Actually, okay, let's go.

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I'm gonna turn this off.

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We're gonna look at this.

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You got The stringy stuff's

happening with the meme.

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Did you learn

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Mark: this part from the internet, too?

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Mmm, yeah.

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And now,

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Bruce: the fun part.

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Mark: I learned it.

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I'm not over.

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I learned it from the internet.

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A.

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How old are you?

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I mean, really, honestly.

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Very.

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Very.

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Yes, you deserve to be on Facebook.

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And two.

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Holy crap, don't we know that the

internet is a cesspool of misinformation?

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We're on the internet.

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Well, yeah, and, uh, we are.

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Bruce: We're

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Mark: part

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Bruce: of the cesspool.

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So, I have now oiled up my hands

with olive oil and I am forming

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like golf ball sized balls, right?

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And I am rubbing them with

oil and making them smooth.

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And I am putting them on a roasting pan.

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And Mark has turned the oven on for me.

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What'd you turn it

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Mark: on to?

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To 375.

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And it's on convection because we

want as much browning as possible.

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And while we're doing this, and while

he's making these, I just want to say that

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what I find so funny is that my New York

City husband knows what a golf ball is.

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This just tells you how long we've

lived in the country with country clubs.

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Bruce: I grew up.

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In New York City, going to

miniature golf, putt putt.

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So I knew about golf balls, they were

pink and green and blue and yellow.

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And you had to get them through

the clown's nose and all of that.

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So I

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Mark: knew all about golf balls.

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So did you go to the putt putt that had

the Our Lady of the Bathtub like I did?

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No,

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Bruce: this was Jewish putt putt.

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Jewish putt putt?

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Yeah, it was like, you had to

get it through the menorah.

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Oh.

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That is absurd.

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But it was right across the

street from the best diner that

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ever existed in Queens, New York.

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Yeah, I'm not

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Mark: talking anymore to you because

you're talking about Jewish putt putt.

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The Seville, you've been to that diner.

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I have.

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You have.

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Um, okay, so what I'm gonna do is, uh,

get away from Jewish putt putt because

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it's just the, there's too much anti

Semitism waiting to happen right there.

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Okay.

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I'm gonna talk about what I'm doing, which

is I am chopping a small yellow onion.

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And I have one of those green.

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You can also use a small green

bell pepper if you want, but, um, a

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cubanelle or italian frying pepper,

I've stemmed it, I'm cutting it away,

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and I'm chopping it, and I'm gonna

also chop up two cloves of garlic.

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Bruce: And while you're doing that, I have

put a flame under my pot, and I've put

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in three tablespoons of olive oil, and to

that, this is the way I like to do things.

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I'm adding a tablespoon

of chopped fresh rosemary.

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Oh, suddenly it's fresh.

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We

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Mark: don't have to use the dried stuff

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Bruce: anymore.

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One and a half teaspoons of fennel

seeds, a teaspoon of chili flakes,

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and a teaspoon of anchovy paste.

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And I put those aromatics

and spices into the oil.

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And they fry up and they get

very flavorful and delicious,

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but I don't want to burn them.

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And then we're going to throw all those

veggies that Mark chipped up into the pan.

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Mark: Right.

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And so all this goes in the pan.

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And if you're worried about anchovy

paste and you think, Gross, I

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don't want that in meatballs.

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Trust me, it just cooks down

and becomes this wildly Savory

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background taste in everything.

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It makes it so much more delicious.

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So we're going to step away from

this for a moment and let it reduce

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Bruce: and come back.

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The onions and peppers are

all browned on the edges.

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Everything is wilted down.

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It's absolutely gorgeous.

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So we're reducing the heat

and we're adding one pound

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of sliced cremini mushrooms.

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That is brown button mushrooms

or baby portobello mushrooms.

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And here's a trick.

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Now is the time to add salt.

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A half a teaspoon will help draw

the moisture out of these mushrooms

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and that moisture will evaporate.

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I want the mushrooms to reduce and

brown just like the onions did.

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About five minutes.

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We got to come back to that.

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So wait, before we do that, wait,

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Mark: wait,

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Bruce: wait.

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I think

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Mark: that this is a

really important thing.

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Um, you do have to let mushrooms

sweat and you have to let that

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liquid come out and then reduce down.

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Otherwise you can have

a really watery sauce.

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Mushrooms are So loaded

with water and moisture.

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You really need to let that come out.

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And plus that also, as it reduces,

adds a ton of flavor to the sauce.

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So, okay, we're going to

cut away and come back.

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Now it's time to deglaze the pan.

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So we have about a half

a cup of dry vermouth.

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You could also use unsweetened apple

juice if you don't want any liquor.

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If you want to get fancy, you

can use dry white wine, use

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dry cherry, use more salad.

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You can use masala, you can get really as

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Bruce: fancy as you want.

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Just don't open up the a hundred

dollars bottle of Barolo.

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Mark: Don't, no, do not deglaze with that.

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And don't deglaze with bourbon.

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Or if you don't wanna

burn your house down.

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So you pour that in, scrape

and you scrape everything up.

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And now it comes.

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The big thing, the jar of

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Bruce: Moody tomato sata, which

is a tomato puree from Italy.

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We have talked about Moody before.

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It's been one of the things

making us happy in food this week.

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Ever since I discovered

Mutti, it is all I use.

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In fact, this summer, it is just about

getting tomato time, and I don't even

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think I'm going to put up my own tomatoes

this year, because there's Mutti.

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And while I thought Mutti passata was

the best thing I ever found, I found

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a level of Mutti that's even better.

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It's this Toscana Mutti.

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It gives the name of the farm

where the tomatoes are from.

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It gives the varietal of tomatoes.

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If you could find Mootie and you

can find this Toscana mootie, use

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it that's been poured in and I'm not

wasting a drop of it It's very thick.

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So I'm rinsing the jar out

with some water and pouring

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Mark: that in Okay, and that really

honestly is the bid and so now what

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we're gonna do is we're gonna take those

Meatballs, they have browned in the

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oven for how long they've been in there

about 15 minutes And we're gonna take

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them out of the oven and we're gonna put

them in this sauce and cover it reduce

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the heat to low And let it simmer for

one hour long time It's gonna simmer

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some of that brownie coating on the

meatballs is gonna come off into the

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sauce It's all gonna get much richard.

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You want this at a really slow?

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Simmer not too much.

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It

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Bruce: always amazes me when people

throw meatballs right into a sauce

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like this without browning them.

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I don't understand that

you just boiling them.

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They've got to be browned.

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If you don't want to brown them in the

oven, I sure you could brown them in

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another skillet if you want, but that

takes such a mess and so much time.

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I have even in my life

done them in the air fryer.

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Mark: If you, if you don't brown

your meatballs, um, just to be

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gross, you end up with meat pudding.

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You end up with this like really.

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Soft meat pudding balls.

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Oh, I just, gross.

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Soft meat pudding balls.

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Oh, my.

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Okay, so this is going to go

about an hour, and we will be

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back to taste it and dish it up.

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Bruce: It smells so good in here.

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The tomatoes have reduced a bit.

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The sauce is thick, but not too thick.

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And the last thing I want to do before we

eat it is tear up some fresh basil leaves.

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I have like 12 basil leaves here, and

I'm going to Put those in, stir them in.

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I want that fresh basil

flavor when we eat these.

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We're going to ladle this up.

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These are hot, so we're gonna

have to like do something Mark

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hates, which is blow on your food.

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No,

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Mark: I'm not blowing on it.

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I'm just waiting.

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So what you do is you dish it up, you

coat it, you put as much grated Parmesan

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cheese, Parmigiano Reggiano, please,

into the bowl, and then I add a ton.

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of cracked black pepper, and I

continue to salt because salt

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is my, my weakness in life.

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Bruce: Yeah, I think to me that the cheese

is going to add enough salt to this.

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No, not nearly enough.

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I am, I'm going to blow on

this because I want to try it.

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Oh, this is so hot.

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Savory.

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It's hot.

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It's hot, but it's hot.

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It's delicious.

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It's so savory.

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Wow.

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The problem with tomato sauces for me

is sometimes they could be too sweet.

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Yes.

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And the is not we.

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The moti is not sweet.

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We didn't add any sugar.

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Yes.

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Onions are sweet and even

mushrooms have a sweetness to them.

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And we use sweet sausage.

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Oh.

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And ground beef is sweet,

but it's not sugar.

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Sweet.

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These are.

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A savory deliciousness.

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Mark: Yeah, it's really good.

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And I just want to say that,

uh, Bruce buys the Moody.

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It's expensive.

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And so if you don't know this,

um, you can often find it on

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sale at places like World Market.

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Um.

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Home Goods.

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And Home Goods.

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You can often find it there discounted.

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And if you do, just buy it up.

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In fact, Bruce looks at

the World Market sales.

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And when he sees Moody on

sale, he orders a case.

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And, uh,

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Bruce: goes and picks it up.

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Not only that, World Market has the thing

where if you order online and then you go

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to pick it up, they take 20 percent off.

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So, not only do I get a great sale,

I get even more discount on it.

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Yeah, so,

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Mark: it's just worth the

effort to get better tomato

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:

passata, to get the real thing.

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I know, it's crazy.

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:

sounds really funny, but there's nothing

really extraordinary in our meatballs

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other than maybe, uh, the anchovy paste.

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Yeah.

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There's nothing really crazy here.

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The deal is the passata.

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It's all about that tomato.

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It is all about the tomato.

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It is.

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And we eat this not with noodles,

uh, I just should tell you.

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We eat this with grilled baguettes.

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Pieces, grilled bread pieces.

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Slice them in

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Bruce: half, rub them with olive oil, salt

them, and put them either on the grill or

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:

in the air fryer until they're crunchy.

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You can even rub the bread with

garlic and turn it into grilled

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:

garlic bread if you want.

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These are a fabulous dinner.

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These will last us for a couple of meals.

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And this is worth making

any time of the year.

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:

Mark: Let me just say, before we get

to the last segment of the podcast,

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it would be great if you could rate

this podcast, if you could give

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:

it a review, even great podcast.

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:

Thanks so much for that, because we are

unsupported and choose to remain that way.

446

:

And we would like to remain that way.

447

:

So the way that you can help us and

support us is by giving us a rating.

448

:

If you haven't ever done that, just

go out to whatever platform you're on.

449

:

And dare I ask it, give us five stars and.

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:

Just a comment, like nice podcast.

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:

If you can't, that really

helps things in the analytics.

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:

And it's the way we can remain supported.

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:

Okay.

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:

As is traditional, the final

segment of this podcast, what's

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:

making us happy in food this week.

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Bruce: My sister's generosity.

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She's the best.

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:

sent a 20 pound box of Santa

Rosa plums from the tree in

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:

her backyard in California.

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:

She does it every year.

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:

And I opened that box and I made

a 10 jars of Santa Rosa plum jam.

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:

And I have cut up the.

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:

Other half of them.

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:

And I'm about to make Santa Rosa plum.

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:

Yeah,

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:

Mark: she just goes and gets a

flat rate box and shoves it full of

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:

plums and mails it from California

and it shows up every year.

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:

And in fact, she asked if we wanted a

second box and I might take her up on it.

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:

Yeah, I know.

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:

It's crazy how much fruit they produce

in their backyard from these plum trees.

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:

And it is really good.

472

:

What's making me happy in food this

week is something that's kind of weird.

473

:

Um, I'm sure you can hear it.

474

:

I'm all stopped up and

I'm a little coffee.

475

:

And that's because yes, I have

had the plague COVID and it's

476

:

been disgusting to have it.

477

:

And, uh, I was my first time.

478

:

I thought I was going to get to

donate my body to science as the first

479

:

COVID free body, but no, I caught it.

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:

Um, from a very, very thoughtless

friend who chose to go out to dinner

481

:

with us while she was testing positive.

482

:

Um, that's a whole different subject,

but what's making me happy in food this

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:

week is that I've gotten to eat a lot

of ice cream and I love ice cream and

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:

ice cream is my go to sick food and I

have been eating ice cream like Crazy

485

:

over the last week because it's just the

go to comfort food in the world for me.

486

:

And yes, I prefer swirly ice creams.

487

:

So chocolate swirls and caramel

swirls and salt caramel.

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:

That's all the stuff that I

really go for is the swirly ice

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:

creams with chocolate and caramel.

490

:

And I've just been

indulging myself like crazy.

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:

And it's been really fabulous

to eat really good ice cream,

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:

even if I had to get the plate.

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:

So that's our.

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:

Uh, podcaster for this week.

495

:

Thanks for being a part of

our time on the internet.

496

:

We appreciate your being on this

journey with us, and we certainly

497

:

appreciate your spending time

498

:

Bruce: with us.

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:

And every week we tell you

what's making us happy in food.

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:

So go to our Facebook group, Cooking

with Bruce and Mark, and tell us what's

501

:

making you happy in food this week.

502

:

And we look at those, we share them.

503

:

Sometimes we make them and talk about

them here on Cooking with Bruce and Mark.

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About the Podcast

Cooking with Bruce and Mark
Fantastic recipes, culinary science, a little judgment, hysterical banter, love and laughs--you know, life.
Join us, Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough, for weekly episodes all about food, cooking, recipes, and maybe a little marital strife on air. After writing thirty-six cookbooks, we've got countless opinions and ideas on ingredients, recipes, the nature of the cookbook-writing business, and much more. If you've got a passion for food, we also hope to up your game once and a while and to make you laugh most of the time. Come along for the ride! There's plenty of room!

About your host

Profile picture for Mark Scarbrough

Mark Scarbrough

Former lit professor, current cookbook writer, creator of two podcasts, writer of thirty-five (and counting) cookbooks, author of one memoir (coming soon!), married to a chef (my cookbook co-writer, Bruce Weinstein), and with him, the owner of two collies, all in a very rural spot in New England. My life's full and I'm up for more challenges!