Another in my Looking Back Series – Rissoles
As many of you already know I’m one who is always looking back into my past, I thinks that’s mainly down to the fact that I can hardly believe how far I’ve come from my very humble and simple upbringing travelling the highways and byways of the United Kingdom with my family, who were travellers (better know in those days as Gypsies together with many other unmentionable names as I recall) to where I am today, sitting in the Spanish mountain village surrounded by my Almond, Fig, Plum and Lemon trees, Oh and one grape Vine (just lost my other one during the summer after 22 years) plus 3 rescue dogs, writing this.
One of the things that comes to mind is the memory of turning a leftover roast or other cooked meat into something interesting, sadly, this seems to be a rare thing these days. Possibly because less people have a large roasting joint these days due to either the cost or lack of time to prepare one and consequently there are less leftovers.
One of the things I remember, was the Rissole, we would usually have them on a Monday when the leftover roast from Sunday was scraped off the bone and wound through a hand mincer together with a couple of onions, parsley and a couple of slices of bread, this would clear out any remaining meat and onion from the mincer as well as making the meat go a bit further. Then Mother would mix the whole lot together with a beaten egg, salt and pepper.
Many times I watched mother forming them into balls then flattening them slightly before rolling them in flour and frying them in beef dripping saved from the Sunday roast. To accompany the rissoles would be the Bubble ‘n’ Squeak made from the potatoes and whatever greens we had left over from the Sunday lunch. Although these memories are 60+ years ago, I can still see and smell that meal as if it was yesterday.
So today (Monday) I’ll be using up my Sunday roast rib of beef leftovers and recreating this wonderful memory complete with the ‘Bubble ‘n’ Squeak’ as I have half a nice green cabbage in the pantry. However, as always I like to try something a little different I’m going make a mustard sauce to go with it. If you fancy having a go, here’s my recipe for the Rissoles and the mustard sauce.
Another in my Looking Back Series - Rissoles
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Ingredients
- 450 g meat leftover roast meat, this doesn’t have to be beef, it can be ham, pork or chicken/turkey
- 450 g potatoes cooked ,crushed into lumps
- 1 small bunch parsley leaves only, chopped
- 1 large onion peeled, finely chopped, and briefly fried in butter until soft and golden
- 40 g fresh breadcrumbs
- 1 egg
- freshly grated nutmeg
- salt and pepper
- flour
- 1 beaten egg
- breadcrumbs for coating
- 2 tbsp oil or dripping
- 28 g butter
- For the Sauce
- 275 ml whipping cream
- 2 tbsp good quality Dijon mustard
- 3-4 dashes of Tabasco
DISCLAIMER
I recommend using the Metric measurements (instead of cups & spoons) for more accuracy and better results.
Instructions
- Now you can mince the meat if you have a mincer otherwise you can either cut the meat up small or roughly chop in a food processor (not to a paste though, just pulse it a little) now mix the cooked meat with all the other ingredients, except the flour, beaten egg and extra breadcrumbs, I prefer to do this with my hands, an electric mixer makes it too mushy, you need some texture in the rissole. Form into 12 small balls then flatten slightly, roll in the flour, then the beaten egg and finally the fresh breadcrumbs. Rissoles can be coated simply in flour, that’s how I remember them, but the breadcrumbs give a crustier outside. In a large frying pan, melt the oil or dripping and butter until foaming. Put in the rissoles and fry gently for 7-10 minutes on each side, until well crusted and golden brown. Drain on kitchen paper and keep warm in a low oven while you make the sauce.
- For the Sauce
- In a small saucepan, heat the cream and whisk in the mustard and Tabasco. Simmer for about 5 minutes until it’s the consistency of custard. A few small capers if you have any, or even a sprinkling of snipped chives stirred in at the last minute would be nice but not essential.
Category: Blog, British, Cuisine, Main Courses, Meals for 1 or 2, Meat, Recipes
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Thank you Sushila for your feedback, it’s very much appreciated. Also thanks for the 5 star rating too.
Absolutely delicious results with leftover roast goose from Christmas dinner. I made a few substitutions as I didn’t have quite all the ingredients, eg paprika and chilli instead of nutmeg, but the thing that was so helpful about this recipe was that it got the texture of the mixture just right so that the rissoles didn’t fall apart.
Thanks Mr Paul I will try this as I normally half a 800gr to a kilo piece of meat(for 2 people)and freeze the other half.Now I see that I can make something interesting out of the rest of the whole piece.