Swedish meatballs

This was the second course in our Swedish Eurovision feast!

These  Swedish meatballs are served in a gravy lightly flavored with nutmeg and cardamom. They are delicious, and even better the next day! Lingonberry jelly is traditionally used with Swedish meatballs; you can substitute cranberry or red currant if you can't find lingonberry jelly.

INGREDIENTS

Meatballs:

    1 large onion, finely diced
    2 Tbsp butter
    2/3 cup milk
    4-5 slices of bread, crusts removed, cut in pieces
    2 eggs
    500g  pork mince
    500g pounds beef mince
    2 teaspoons salt
    1 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg
    1 teaspoon ground cardamom
    1 tsp allspice
    2 teaspoons black pepper

Sauce:

    6 Tbsp butter
    1/3 cup flour
    1 litre beef stock
    1/2 to 3/4 cup sour cream
    Salt
    2 to 4 Tbsp of Lingonberry, cranberry, red currant or raspberry jelly, more or less to taste (optional)

METHOD

1 Sauté the onion in the butter  until the onions soften and turn translucent, about 3-4 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool.

2 In a medium bowl, mix the bread pieces with the milk. Set aside for 15 minutes, or until the bread soaks up all the milk. When it does, pulverize the bread in a food processor and pour it into a large bowl.

3 Add the cooled onions to the bowl of milk and bread. Add the rest of the meatball ingredients—eggs, pork, beef, salt, nutmeg, cardamom, allspice, pepper. Using your (clean) hands, mix well for about 2 minutes until the ingredients are well combined.

4 Use a tablespoon to measure out the meat for the meatballs. As you form the meatballs, set each one aside on a sheet pan or plate. You should get 40 to 50 meatballs.

5 Heat 6 tablespoons of butter for the sauce in a large sauté pan over medium heat. When the butter has melted, reduce the heat to medium and add some of the meatballs. Do not crowd the pan. Work in batches, browning them slowly on all sides. Be gentle when you turn them so they don't break apart. Do not cook the meatballs all the way through, only brown them at this stage. Once browned, use a slotted spoon to remove them from the pan, setting them aside so you can make the sauce with the remaining pan butter.

6 Start the sauce. (Check the pan butter to see if it has burned. If the butter tastes burnt, discard the butter and replace with new 6 tablespoons.) Heat the pan butter on medium until hot. Slowly whisk in the flour. Stirring often, let the flour cook until it is the color of coffee-with-cream; this is a classic roux.

7 As the roux is cooking, heat the beef stock in another pot until it simmers. When the roux has cooked until the color of coffee-with-cream, slowly add the hot beef stock a little at a time. Everything will sputter at first, and the sauce will seize up and solidify. Keep stirring and adding stock slowly, and it will loosen up and become silky.

8 Add the meatballs to the sauce and turn the heat down to low. Cover the pot and cook on low heat for 10 minutes. You might need to do this in batches.

9 To finish, move the meatballs to a serving dish. Add the sour cream and mix well. Either add the lingonberry jelly to the sauce or serve it on the side.

Yield: Serves 4 vikings, or 8-10 regular people.