Sambal Meatballs and Rice

Feeling like I should make something different, and having many items
at home that I needed to use up, I decided on this Indian dish. I made it very spicey.
Of course, you can always tone down the spice if you need to. I also served
it with a side of cucumber and tomato salad to tone down the heat of the main
dish.

First, I started with the Sambal. I had many serano chilies, jalapenos, and habeneros. And though I would have
loved to have my seranos be red to give the
sauce a great color, I was happy with the flavor
of the green ones.





I used 6 serano chilies and one large habenaro; minced them up very fine.
I minced up 2 med shallots, very fine. One clove of garlic, minced very fine.
I mixed these together and added some tamarind paste, chili powder, tumeric
and a touch of cardamom, cinnamon and cumin. Then I sauted all of that in a bit
of olive oil. After a minute or two, I added lemon zest and the juice of half a lemon.
Then I set aside.

Next, I made my meatballs. I used a mixture of venison and beef, but you can
use whatever you like. I sauted some minced sweet onion, jalapenos and seranos,
and garlic, then added it to the meat. I also added corriander, cumin, brown sugar,
soy sauce and the juice of the other half of the lemon with some zest. I mixed in
one beaten egg and blended it all together. It was a very wet mixture, so I added
some plain bread crumbs, but you may not need to. You could also add cheese
to them as I think that would be yummy! I formed all my meatballs and fried them
in a good non-stick pan with a touch of olive oil.

I aslo made some white rice, using chicken broth instead of water, salting it well.

To serve, I just put the meatballs on the rice, with the sambal on the side. As I ate it,
I mixed the sambal into my rice, which was wonderful. I probably would have been
happier with a brown rice, but I didn't have any.

All in all, it was a wonderful meal!
See the salad recipe in the next post-