Meat Roll "Stephanie"

Today, it snowed for the first time in Central Pennsylvania. I guess it's winter. What better time for two of my all-time favorite comfort foods. Also, my all-time favorite soccer team is playing an important game this afternoon, so there will be soccer-watching and eating!

Soccer and meatloaf just go together. Especially when the club is Chelsea, a working-class team. I started eating red meat again about 5 years ago, and that's when I came up with an adaptation of a meat "roll" that my mom always made when I was a child. At home, this meat roll is commonly called "Stephanie." I have no idea who Stephanie is, really, but a google search for her meat roll confirms it's quite a popular recipe.

For my version of it, you will need:

2 lbs of ground beef, preferably not too fatty

4 eggs - one raw and 3 hard boiled 

1/2 cup bread crumbs. Mine were Italian flavored, you can use plain or any other flavor

1/2 head onion, chopped

4 small dill pickles, cut up in spears

1/2 cup thawed carrot/green peas mix

1/2 cup of grated cheese, any yellow firm variety will do. Today I used brick cheese from a local dairy farm

1 tbs salt

1 tbs oregano

1/2 tbs pepper

and my secret ingredient:

4 tbs of red pepper/tomato spread called Lutenitsa. You can get it online or ... in Bulgaria. If you don't have a way of finding it, you can use a paste mix of ketchup and paprika, or a mix of even parts Korean red pepper paste, kochujang (but careful, it's very spicy) and thick tomato puree. All these are decent substitutes, but I prefer lutenica by far!

Mix the meat, chopped onions, bread crumbs, raw egg, pepper spread, and spices together and let stand in the fridge for at least 15 minutes. Then spread it out on aluminum foil and arrange the hard boiled eggs, carrots/green peas, and pickle spears on top. 

Start folding together by gradually lifting one edge of the foil (start at the wide side), and slowly and carefully roll into, well, a meat roll.Do make sure that the roll is tightly packed together, as it will prevent it from crumbling or falling apart when you serve. Transfer to a baking pan and bake at 450 degrees for about 35 minutes. Take out and sprinkle with the grated cheese and bake for another 5 minutes until the cheese is golden brown. Before serving, I transfered the roll to a cold pan, and of course managed to break it in half, with one half almost completely disintegrating into its components. I think I managed to more or less reconstruct it (pssst, noone saw that!). It's advisable that you apply more diligence and patience.

Inspired by Yana, I also decided to make a pot of my lentils-spinach-curry soup to serve with the meat roll. A very, very large pot of lentils soup, enough to feed a household of two for a while. It also freezes very well.

My ingredients:

1 package of dry lentils

1/2 large head of onions, diced

1/2 cup chopped carrots

1 red pepper, chopped

1 small frozen package of whole leaf spinach

1 can petite diced tomatoes

2 tbs summer savory (you can use thyme or oregano too, if you'd prefer)

2 tbs paprika

2 tbs olive oil

2 tbs salt

12 cups of water (it's a VERY large pot)

My secret ingredients:

1 small pack of curry

A handful of my grandfather's mystery garden herb pods that we've always used for lentils and never called anything other than "pods". I finally looked it up today and it is ... Trigonella foenum-graecum, or fenugreek. Who knew! A fascinating herb. I am not quite sure where to get it from, other than my grandfather's garden, but perhaps in a well-stocked spice aisle.

I did not sauté anything, just put all the ingredients together in my large pot. The different colors of the vegetables looked really pretty.



I added the water, lentils, and all the spices to this pretty pile. Then I brought it to a boil, and let it summer for about an hour on medium-low heat (4 out of 9). 

Serve the soup and meat roll with nice whole wheat bread, and a generous amount of soccer cheering.

BLUE IS THE COLOUR!