Swedish Meatballs

Developing any recipe is a lot of fun and this was a good challenge.  To reduce the amount of fat in the recipe, I baked the meatballs before combining them with the remaining ingredients.  It is important to allow the ground meat to season for several hours before cooking the meatballs so the flavor profile is properly developed.  (If you are Swedish, this is not traditional because I put an Italian spin on it by adding garlic.) 

Ingredients:
1 lb. of ground beef (chuck)
1 lb. of ground pork
1 cup of freshly chopped parsley
four sprigs of fresh thyme
1 cup of Stouffer's chicken stuffing mix
2 eggs
1 cup of sour cream
1 cup of beef consommé
1/2 cup of heavy cream
1 tbl. soy sauce
1 tbl. of garlic powder
1 tsp. of onion powder

Combine the ground meat, parsley, thyme, garlic powder, onion powder and salt and pepper (a pinch of each).   Add the stuffing mix (I use this instead of fresh bread) and the two eggs.  Mix the ingredients well and allow to rest for several hours.

Shape the meatballs and put them in a baking dish.  Cook at 350F for about 30 minutes. 

Reduce oven heat to 300F. 

Take a large saucepan that can be used in your oven and put the sour cream, the beef consommé and the soy sauce.  Mix well.  When the meatballs come out of the oven, put them in the saucepan with the sour cream mixture.  Do not discard the pan juices.  Pour the heavy cream into the pan you baked the meatballs in, stirring well to loosen the stuff on the bottom of the pan.  Scrape until you get all that goodness from the bottom of the pan and then pour everything into the sour cream mixture.  Stir with a wooden spoon.  Put this pan in your oven to finish cooking for about an hour or so.  To thicken the gravy, add a can of cream of mushroom soup if necessary.  Serve the meatballs over freshly cooked pasta. 

This is a very tasty version of Swedish Meatballs and though it may not be traditional, it is good enough to serve to guests.  Enjoy!