…it’s finally Christmas Eve – which, to me, means it’s time to cook up something delicious. When you’re married to a chef, you get used to NEVER COOKING at all. So I make an effort to cook once a year on Christmas Eve – mainly because I’m usually stuck at home all day with nothing else today so I thought it would be nice to put my time to a good use so when E gets home from one of the busiest restaurant days of the year, we can sit down and have a nice dinner together (also because all other restaurants would be closed by that time).
I don’t do fancy food. I only cook stuff I want to eat – homemade, simple, comfort food. Every year, I try to cook something new that I’ve never done before. In the past few years since I started our traditional Christmas Eve dinner, I’ve done ham with my own glaze, chicken pot-pie, roasted Cornish game hen, and turkey leek pot-pie. This year, I decided to try turkey meatballs – because I just LOVE pasta marinara, and meatballs would be something new I will have to learn to do.
First of – Spicy Marinara. This is my own recipe so it’s not quite exact. I just taste as I go so you’ll have to modify as appropriate if you are trying to follow it.
SPICY MARINARA
4 cloves of garlic – I like mine very garlic-y so if you’re not a garlic lover, use 2
Half a red onion
2 medium carrots
2 stalks of celery – I didn’t have any celery this time so I skipped it, but I usually would put some in the sauce.
A few leaves of fresh basil
A few sprig of fresh oregano or dried oregano
Extra virgin olive oil
Fresh Roma tomatoes or canned whole tomatoes – if you use fresh tomatoes, just boil them then peel the skin off. Blend in a blender. If you use canned tomatoes, no need to do anything extra.
Kosher salt and pepper
Sugar
Lots of crushed red peppers
A jar of pre-made marinara sauce – I add this to help thicken the sauce since I like mine very thick and chunky. You can skip this if you like your marinara to be light.
To start, I add garlic, onion, and carrots to the food processor and chop them up. Remember – the normal recipe calls for celery as well, but I don’t have any so I skipped it.
Add a couple tablespoon of olive oil to a medium hot pan. Sauteed the vegetable mix until soft. Chop up basil and oregano. Add the herbs to the vegetable mix. .Season with salt and pepper. Add to the tomatoes and a jar of the pre-made sauce.
At this point, I also add a full spoon of sugar. It really brings out the sweetness of the tomatoes.
Add a lot (or little) of the crushed red pepper. I use a lot because this is called “spicy” marinara after all. Simmer on low heat until the sauce thickens. Taste and adjust the seasoning. If you like it chunky then you can serve it as is. If you like the sauce to be smooth then use a hand blender to blend the sauce.
Next up, Turkey Meatballs. You can also use ground chicken. I adapted this from Giada De Laurentiis’ recipe.
TURKEY MEATBALLS
1 lb of ground turkey
2 cloves of garlic
1 large egg
1/2 cup of bread crumbs
1/4 of chopped fresh parsley. You can also add other herbs. I added a tiny bit of oregano that I had left over from the marinara sauce.
1/2 cup of grated Parmesan cheese. You can use other cheeses. Some recipes call for Pecorino Romano, but I only like Parmesan so that’s the only cheese I’m using.
3-4 tablespoon of ketchup
Extra virgin olive oil
Kosher salt and pepper
Spicy Marinara Sauce
Start with mincing the garlic finely. Add garlic, bread crumbs, egg, parsley, Parmesan, ketchup and turkey to a bowl. Season with lots of salt and pepper. Make sure you don’t under season because you won’t be able to taste until after they cooked. Mix with your hands until the mixture is well combined. Form the mixture into small meatballs. I like small meatballs because they brown easier, and the little brown bits are what make them so tasty.
Heat a couple spoons of olive oil in a medium high heat pan. Add meatballs and let them brown without moving them for a few minutes. Turn them and let the other side brown. Take the meatballs off the heat. Drain any excess oil from the pan. Add the spicy marinara that you just made to the pan. Add the meatballs back and let them simmer in the sauce until fully cooked. Served with pasta. I use spaghetti for this meal, and it was soooooooooo yummy! I could honestly eat a bowl of just plain, cooked spaghetti noodles. Sprinkle with some freshly grated Parmesan and chopped fresh basil and parsley and serve with your best bottle of Red – preferably Chianti.
Buon Appetito and Merry Christmas Eve~
Images: 1. Slices of Beauty, 2. Patterson Maker, the rest are my own
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