Cookin' with Wood

Porcupine Balls

I couldn't recall doing anything with ground beef in awhile, so I pulled a pound of it out of the freezer and tossed it into the fridge to thaw. I wanted to do something a little different, so I browsed around the internet for a while and didn't have much luck. Don't get me wrong, there were a lot of great recipes for ground beef, but only two of them caught my eye. This is one of them. I'd heard of and had porcupine balls before, but I never made them myself, so I got to work. I was happy to find out that I already had all the other ingredients in the cupboards. No need to run to the grocery store. To me, that means I don't have to get dressed and jump in the car, so I can cook in my pajamas. That might be why I don't have my own cooking show yet.

Anyway, I dumped the ground beef, rice, salt, pepper, and minced garlic into the bowl and started mixing it all together with my hands (of course, I washed them first). Then I thought, "I should probably get that saucepan going awhile."

So I washed my hands again, and put the three cans of stuff in the saucepan and stirred them together and heated to a boil. Then I turned down the heat and simmered for a few minutes while I made the meatballs.

Getting back to the meatballs, I washed my hands again and, using my hands, took the ground beef mixture and formed it into meatballs that were about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. I think I made about a dozen of them. If you've never made meatballs with your hands before, just take a portion of the meat that looks like it will result in a 1 1/2 inch diameter meatball, and squeeze it between your palms. Then roll it around a little to form it into a ball. There may be some cracks in it, so press the cracks together and roll it around a little more. You'll get the hang of it by the second ball.

Once you've rolled all of your meatballs, add a couple tablespoons of olive oil to the large skillet and then the balls, and brown over medium heat. The original recipe says to brown on all sides, but balls only have two sides: the inside and the outside. You only want to brown the outside. You also want to pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees F.

Once that's done, you have an option: If your skillet is safe for use in the oven, pour the tomato mixture over the meaballs and bake for one hour. If not, transfer the meatballs to a baking dish, then pour the tomato mixture over the meatballs and bake for one hour. Either way is fine. I used a baking dish. Here's what I found out: The 9x13" baking dish I used was a little too large. I thought it would be best because it allowed for space between the meatballs. I was wrong. A smaller dish would work better because it would keep the meatballs immersed in the tomato mixture, while mine were exposed at the top. Plus, I baked them for the full hour, at 350 degrees F, which might be long enough for a meatloaf of two pounds, so I think I over-baked them a little. They still tasted great.

Here's another thing: While I was browning the meatballs in the skillet, some of the excess rice ended up in the pan and fried (well, burned). When I was transferring the meatballs from the skillet to the baking dish, I figured I'd toss all the scapings from the skillet in there, too. You know, for flavor. Well, don't do that. You'll just end up with very hard pieces of rice in your dish.

I made some instant mashed potatoes to go along with the meatballs.

Disclaimer: No porcupines were harmed in the writing of this column.

Bob is the author of "Don't Fry Bacon with Your Shirt Off!  A Single Man's Guide to the Kitchen"  a PublishAmerica book.

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Member Comments

View Comments: | 1-3 | Post a comment

msamerica101
07-20-08 11:12 PM »Report Abuse	Very creative. I will vote for the last one which is misspelled.
pressmanbob
07-20-08 5:16 AM »Report Abuse	Some alternative names for "Porcupine Balls" might include: Porcupine Meatballs, Meatballs with Rice, Ground Beef and Rice Meatballs, Meatballs a la Wood, No Matter What You Do Don't Stand Behind Them Meatballs, and if you include some kind of tubular pasta you can call it Porcupine Penii. Sorry about the spelling.
msamerica101
07-17-08 3:53 PM »Report Abuse	The name of the recipe turns me off. Can you call it something else?

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