kung pao chicken meatballs with dressed spaghetti

Hello! Here for the kung pao chicken meatballs? Well you’re in luck – there’s no time for a long ramble today as lots to do but you know, I think you deserve a treat. So we have the kung pao chicken meatballs recipe coming up in a moment but first, look at our tree!

tree

Isn’t that a beauty? But let me tell you: blood was almost shed. Let me paint you a picture. There’s me, in the bath, luxuriating / basking in a sea of Molton Brown bubbles and The Archers omnibus playing in the background. Paul was in the living room fussing about the tree like a make-up artist at a wedding. I could hear the occasional shout and strop but hey, the bath was lovely. After an hour or so a plaintive cry came from the living room for me to come and help – his tiny Nick-Nack legs didn’t quite afford him the height needed to pop our furry star on top of the tree. Fair enough – the tree is 7ft and Paul drives a Smart-car.

I clamber out, the bubbles caressing my every curve. It was exactly like the bit in Casino Royale when Daniel Craig emerges from the sea in his little blue knickers, only with far more heart disease and loud straining. I mince into the living room and exclaim at how pretty the tree is before immediately fretting as to whether our Dyson Digital can cope with the quarter-tonne of pine needles that already litter the floor. Completely nude, I lean into the tree to make the final adjustment, to adorn it with the shiny star of Christmas, and how was I rewarded?

With a fucking pine needle right down my hog’s eye. My beef bullet was speared by the cold fingers of Christmas present. I know that a lot of you ladies out there will have been through child birth but honestly, that would have been like ripping off a wet plaster compared to this. I don’t like to exaggerate but it was literally the worst pain in the world. There’s places that nothing should ever venture and a gentleman’s scrotum-totem is one of these. I since looked it up on the internet only to find it’s an actual fetish, with people putting all sorts of things down there. Internet: what is wrong with you?

Anyway, you’ll be relieved to know that he’s fine and still in working order. Phew, right? Let’s get straight to the meatballs, apropos of nothing. This makes enough for four and yeah, it looks like a bit of a ballache to make, but it’s worth it – something different to that boring old SW meatballs in the freezer! Plus you could make the balls and freeze for later.

kung pao chicken meatballs

to make kung pao chicken meatballs you will need:

for the spaghetti

500g spaghetti (or noodles!)
4 cloves of garlic, minced
3 spring onions, sliced
160ml soy sauce
150ml chicken stock
75ml shoaxing rice wine (4 syns)
2 tbsp red chilli paste
2 tbsp rice vinegar
2 tbsp cornflour (2 syns)
1 tbsp sesame oil (6 syns)

for the meatballs

500g minced chicken (or turkey)
1 onion, finely diced
1 egg
35g porridge oats (1x HeB)
1 tbsp sriracha sauce (1/2 syn)
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
2 garlic cloves, minced

You know when we say mince ginger or garlic? Use a microplane grater. It’ll stop your fingers smelling, as long as you stop picking your bum. But seriously, don’t fart about peeling ginger or garlic, just grate it as it is – it’ll be perfect. Click here for our recommended mincer!

for the sauce

4 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp sriracha (1/2 syn)
1 tbsp red chilli paste
1 tbsp honey (3 syns)

to make kung pao chicken meatballs you should:

bit of a fuck on this, but I promise it’s worth it.

firstly, preheat the oven to 200 degrees
then, make the meatballs – spray a non-stick baking sheet with a little oil
mix together all of the meatball ingredients, roll into about twenty meatballs, plop onto the baking sheet and cook for twenty five minutes, and whilst that’s going on, do the other bits
next, bring a large pan of water to the boil and cook the spaghetti (or noodles) according to the instructions – try and time this so that the spaghetti will be finished at the same time as the meatballs
meanwhile, in a bowl whisk together all the other ingredients for the spaghetti, except for the garlic, and keep to one side
add a little oil to a large frying pan and heat over a medium-high heat
add the minced garlic and cook for about thirty seconds
pour in the reserved sauce, bring to the boil and then reduce to a simmer for a few minutes, until slightly thickened
add the cooked and drained spaghetti (or noodles), toss well until nicely coated with the sauce
in another bowl, whisk together the sauce ingredients
when the meatballs are cooked, toss them gently in the sauce
serve the spaghetti onto plates, and top with the meatballs
sprinkle over the spring onions
we added a few chopped peanuts as well for a bit of crunch (if you’re doing the same, remember to syn them)