Kofta!

No, it isn't a curse! It's a meatball with herbs!
Yes, that's right, I've been cooking again.

This time I made little asian/middle eastern meatballs, grilled them, and served them with rice and some salad. For those who need a visual cue take a look to the right - that's from the food Network, and essentially what I made.

The ingredients are listed below.

Mix all the ingredients in a bowl until pretty-well blended together. Then pull pieces out and form them into little balls, between 1 and 2 cm in diameter. It doesn't really matter if they're all small or all big; just pick a size that you can push a skewer through and stick to it! The cook in the photograph formed long ones, I use round ones - it really doesn't matter!

1 spoonful of minced garlic	1 pound ground lamb or beef
almost a cup of well-chopped onion	3 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
1 tablespoon ground coriander	1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 tablespoon ground cinnamon	1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper	1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

Once you've got your mixture in organised pieces, put them on a plate of baking tray and leave them in the fridge for from 1 to 12 hours. This lets them rest and the flavours blend.

Take them from the fridge and skewer them ! 3 or 4 should fit on a large skewer.

You can grill them on an outdoor grill or indoors if your oven is equipped with a grilling element on its ceiling. About 5-7 minutes should give you a soft and juicy kofta (not bloody and not crisp all the way through!).

Warning: if you do them indoors make sure your flatmates are either included in the meal or out - the smell of cooking these has been known to turn harmless little old ladies with blunt dentures into ravening tigresses!

Serve them with rice or couscous and a vegetable, or in Pita bread with salad (shredded cabbage and tomatoes).

Have fun!

TTFN