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Processing
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Difficulty
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Beef balls are a dish that is widely used in cooking, and the method of making them is quite simple, so you can easily make them at home without having to buy them outside. Today, TasteVN will go to the kitchen to share with you how to make chewy and crispy beef balls at home.
Ingredients for Beef Balls For 1.2 kg
Ground beef 1.2 kg Crushed pepper 10 g Chopped garlic 7 g Fish sauce 5 tablespoons Sugar 1.5 tablespoons Half a teaspoon of monosodium glutamate 1/2 g Potato starch 2 tablespoons (corn starch) Baking powder 1 teaspoon (Baking powder) Shallots 1 bulb Seasoning powder 1 tablespoon (chicken or beef)
Tools: Meat grinder, pot, stove
Note: You should choose lean beef or beef shank, and the meat must be fresh to make beef balls, as this will make the beef balls chewier and tastier.
How to Make Beef Balls
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Grinding Meat
Take ice cubes into a bag and crush them. Mix potato starch and baking powder in a bowl. In another bowl, combine fish sauce, sugar, and monosodium glutamate, and dissolve them together.
Take 1.2 kg of meat and divide it into 3 portions of 400 grams each, then put it into a grinder. Next, add 1/3 of the prepared fish sauce into the grinder, and grind at high speed for about 1 – 2 minutes until the meat is fluffy and the seasonings are evenly mixed.
When the meat is finely ground, stop the machine and use a spoon to separate the meat evenly so that it does not clump together, making it easier for the machine to operate.
Quickly add 1 tablespoon of the crushed ice and 1/3 of the potato starch and baking powder mixture to the meat, and continue grinding at high speed until the ingredients are well blended. Before finishing, add cooking oil and grind for another 30 seconds.
After grinding, you will have a smooth, elastic mixture called beef paste. Place this beef paste in the freezer refrigerator and continue to do the same with the remaining 2 portions of meat.
Note:
- When making beef balls, you should place a silicone baking mat under the machine to prevent it from moving and to extend the machine’s lifespan; if you don’t have one, it’s fine.
- Adding ice cubes to the mixture will help keep the meat at a cold temperature and make it firmer. This method is applied for quick beef ball preparation. You also don’t need to crush the ice too small, or you can just add it whole into the grinder.
- The beef to be ground must be at a temperature below 5 degrees Celsius, so before grinding, you should leave the meat in the freezer overnight to reach the appropriate temperature (the texture of the ground beef will now be like ice cream). The reason is that during the grinding process, if the meat is not cold and is ground for too long, it will cook slightly due to the high heat generated by the grinder, which will cause the beef balls to spoil due to the loss of cohesion.
- The unused meat should be kept in the freezer or the freezer compartment of the refrigerator, and only taken out when needed to ensure the temperature. Similarly, the ground beef mixture should also be stored in the same way before continuing to grind the remaining portion.
- You should not use too much baking powder because when boiling or frying, the beef balls will puff up and then gradually deflate, losing the sweetness of the meat.
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Add seasoning
After grinding the three portions of meat, take them out and put them into the machine, then add pepper and garlic, and grind on speed 1 for about 30 seconds, then increase to high speed for everything to mix well together, completing the ground meat.
Note: The amount of garlic and pepper can be adjusted to suit your family’s taste.
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Shape and boil beef balls
Bring 1.5 liters of water to a boil, adding in 1 shallot and 1 tablespoon of chicken or beef seasoning so that the beef balls are sweeter when boiled, letting the water boil well on the stove.
Put on gloves and rub a little cooking oil on both hands. Use a spoon that has also been coated with cooking oil.
Use your hands to take a piece of beef mixture, pinch out a portion with your index finger and thumb to your desired size, then use the convex side of the spoon to drop it into the boiling water, which will create round beef balls. Do this quickly so that the beef balls cook at the same time.
The beef balls will start to cook as soon as they touch the water, always floating on the surface, indicating that they are chewy and the process is done correctly.
Take one ball from the pot to check; if it’s cooked, remove it and place it in a bowl of cold water to make the beef balls firmer. Then take them out and cover with plastic wrap to prevent them from drying out.
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Final Product
The beef balls after completion have an attractive round appearance. When cooked, they are crispy and chewy without being crumbly, retaining the sweet flavor of the meat. To store the beef balls, simply place them in a sealed bag and put them in the freezer, and they can be used for a long time.
With the method above, you can easily make safe beef balls for your family to enjoy. The meatballs wrapped tightly and stored in the freezer can last for 1 month.
A few small notes when making beef balls:
- If using whole meat to make beef balls, cut the meat into small pieces when purchasing, then place them in the freezer before grinding.
- After grinding the meat, you can use a pestle to pound it before placing it in the freezer to make the meat chewier.
- The principle when making beef balls, sausage, pork sausage,… is that the meat must be fresh, the meat must be cold, and the process must be quick.
See more:
Beef balls are a delicious dish loved by everyone, so we hope that TasteVN’s sharing will help you have more recipes to make this attractive dish for the whole family while ensuring food safety. Wishing you success.
*Refer to the images and recipes from the YouTube channel Và nh Khuyên Lê.
