Swedish Meatballs in Snakeskin Heels

Swedish Meatballs are a beautiful thing on a late winter night.  A classic, somehow more embraced by middle America than Sweden since the 1950’s, and the miraculously transcend time and trend.  You can take the easy way out and pop down to Ikea, come home a few hundred dollars poorer with a trunk full of candles, hangers and knickknacks, along with a bag of frozen meatballs authentico(ish).  Most of the time, I like the hard way though.  I feel it builds character, the way I constantly root something down to its essence in order to reconstruct it my way.  It’s nice to know what the compositional choices are so you can make your own still life, since you know a roomful of artists are each going to sketch it a different way.  It’s the same with Swedish meatballs.  The first thing you must choose is the meat. 

You will find recipes calling for various types of ground beef: top round, chuck, bottom round, maybe even sirloin.  Others adhere strictly to the swine line of thinking a la pork shoulder or butt.  Still others insist that veal is the traditional ground meat in Swedish meatballs, or perhaps lamb, venison, buffalo or elk.  I have used all of the above, always grinding myself, and always noting the flavor difference.  My personal taste consensus is that a combination thereof is best, and my gut-feeling is that the Swedish dame who started this craze long ago probably just used what she had on hand from her husband’s spoils out in the icebox. 

Next point of contention is what to serve alongside the steamy balls.  I think I’m in the losing minority who insist meatballs should be served over egg noodles.  Most, including the omniscient authority Ikea, serve them alongside a few halved, creamy new potatoes, which I think is taking the easy way out. If you’re going to the trouble of grounding your own meat, making a bread panade, forming the balls, and frying them up, don’t you think they’re worth showcasing on something a bit grander than potatoes? Don’t get me wrong, I spent many years in Idaho and have no prejudice against potatoes, bakers, fingerlings, Russian banana or otherwise.   I just feel that they belie the inherent glamour of a nutmeg-peppered, cream-drenched, glistening Swedish meatball. 

Homemade egg noodles embody kitchen elegance to me, strange as it may sound.  I’ve been rolling out sheet after sheet of pasta, hand-cutting it into wide, pappardelle-sized noodles for as long as I can remember.  My grandparents taught me the art when I was young and we would make Grandpa’s German chicken and noodles almost weekly.  Now I use semolina instead of white flour and duck instead of chicken eggs, but the noodles remain a mainstay of my personal history.  You’re probably wondering where the elegance comes in.  Apparently my grandpa’s mother taught him to make the noodles way back when, and she was one of those women who was never caught without her face made-up, pearls in her ears, and a sweeping gown, even in the kitchen.  I used to mix noodle-making with dress-up as a child, and I still do that in the kitchen to a degree.  There’s something indulgently satisfying about rolling out counter-sized sheets of pasta in heels; try it, you’ll see.  Plus the heels give you leverage on the counter and make rolling just a wee bit easier, I promise.  I like to complete the look with a dress a la Little House on the Prairie, just one of my many eccentricities. 

Finally, we discuss which compote serves Swedish meatballs best.  Living in the Pacific Northwest, I’m unfortunately not privy to loads of lingonberries.  Lingonberry is the traditional jelly to serve with Swedish meatballs, but I do hate to buy things out of a jar as you may have come to know, so I tend to go with a fruit I can get my hands on to boil down myself.  Lingonberry has a hint of tartness, enough that I don’t think obvious fruits like strawberries, blackberries or raspberries would replicate it very well.  Instead I use cranberries when they’re in season; boiled down into a simple sauce they add a touch of sweetness but more importantly pack a puckering punch that rounds out the meatballs quite nicely.