Turkish Style Meatballs

I love cooking these meatballs!  Why?  Because
when I have time, I prepare and freeze them.  When the time comes for when I don’t have time, I just take them out and throw them in a skillet.  As a matter of fact, being scared of my upcoming very busy winter, I have prepared a stash of bags of meatballs.  The best part is, they don’t take up a lot of space!

Ingredients:

• 3 pounds, 80% lean ground beef  
• 1/2 bouquet of parsley
• 2 small to middle-sized onions
• 1 1/2 spoon of tomato paste (not absolutely necessary; most people don’t use it)
• 1 egg
• 1/3 cup of bread crumbs
• 3-4 cloves of garlic
• 2 tablespoon cumin
• 1 tablespoon black pepper
• Salt, chili powder, crashed red peppers, a small pinch of lemon pepper, garlic salt to taste ( I just love spices!) (I used 2/3 tablespoon of salt, 1/4 tbl spoon chili powder, 1/2 crashed red pepper).

Directions:

1. Grate the onion and garlic in food processor and then grate the parsley separately.  Don’t beat up the parsley too much.  
2. In a large bowl, combine the beef, onion, parsley, tomato paste, egg, bread crumbs and all the spices and mix them all.
3. Take pieces from the mixture and roll them into meatballs.  Press them with your palms. This is not only easier to store and fry, but this is also how Turkish people often make meatballs. 
4. After finishing the whole mixture, place them in a quarter-sized storage bags and freeze.  With these ingredients, I have placed 9 meatballs in each bag and ended up with 6 bags (9x6=54 meatballs). 
5. Or, just throw them in a skillet, fry until cooked and enjoy.

Tips:

1. If you are using 93% lean, you can add a little bit of olive oil.
2.  If you have a rather soft mixture, you can always add bread crumbs.
3. They are even more delicious when you make them with ground buffalo.
4. You can leave out the garlic salt, lemon pepper, or crashed red peppers if you prefer.