Swedish meatballs, using jackrabbit or venison

My kids favorite meal is Swedish meatballs with mashed potatoes and gravy. I cannot blame them as it is one of my own favorites. It is one of those great dishes that you can freeze and thaw later. Just give it a quick fry on the stove and it will be as good as freshly made.

Through the year I make the meatballs different. The Christmas type meatballs traditionally is made with different seasoning than meatballs I would make in Easter or in the summer. The meat choice plays a part too. Beef works but I tend to avoid it if I have moose, deer or jackrabbit meat at home. Depending on type of meat you would also make them slightly different.

Meatballs are excellent to experiment with. Once you have made mixed the meat I recommend splitting it and trying out smaller batches with some common Swedish spices for meatballs like: juniper berries, allspice, caraway seeds, a little bit of brown sugar or 1 tbsp of brandy. After trying these out you will find your version of meatballs - make it your own tradition and enjoy at Christmas, Holidays or when the kids are just starving for a treat.

My traditional 1-day-after-elk-season rabbit hunt, which after 1 hour had given me jackrabbit for Swedish meatballs and some cottontail rabbits that are still waiting in the freezer. After vacuum packing the rabbits they aged for 40°C day grades (which in my fridge equals roughly about 10 days).

CAN YOU USE JACKRABBIT FOR SWEDISH MEATBALLS?

The past weekend I made Jackrabbit Swedish Meatballs. The result was amazing!

I used 3 jackrabbit saddles, aged for 40°C day grades. The rabbit was mixed with 10% pork. This gave me close to 2 lbs worth of meat - plenty for making meatballs.

Swedish Meatballs (venison or jackrabbit)

INGREDIENTS: JACKRABBIT ALTERNATIVE

1 kg (2.2 lbs) ground jackrabbit
(optional) 100g (3.5 oz) ground pork fat or pork
2 eggs
1.5 dl ( ~ 3/4 cup) oats
1.5 dl ( ~ 3/4 cup) liquid (water | milk | oatmilk or similar)
1/2 - 3⁄4 tbsp Knorr broth powder
1/2 tsp ground black or white pepper
1 tbsp thyme
5-8 juniper berries
1 tbsp coarse mustard
5 allspice berries

INGREDIENTS: NOTEWORTHY VARIATIONS

Use Italian breadcrumbs instead of plain breadcrumbs for more flavor.
Use cream as a liquid.
½ yellow onion, very finely chopped and fried until soft and golden but not browned. To be mixed in with the meat.
1 garlic clove: press it and fry it together with the onion.

3 jackrabbit saddles. Remove the silver skin with a sharp knife and grind the meat.

The leftover bones can be used to create an excellent broth that will be used later. Start with meat broth with extra amounts of water, cook the bones for 1 hour at least and let the broth reduce until the flavor is prominent.

INGREDIENTS: VENISON ALTERNATIVE

1 kg (2.2 lbs) ground venison
2 eggs
1.5 dl ( ~ 3/4 cup) breadcrumbs (alternatively quick oats)
1.5 dl ( ~ 3/4 cup) broth
½ tsp salt (optional - depends on the saltiness of the broth)
½ tsp ground black peppar
1 tbsp thyme
2 – 3 liter (2-3 quarts) of meat broth in a pot.

Making meatballs

Grind all the spices in a mortar. Mix the spices and the oats. Add the Knorr bouillon powder and the liquid. Let it sit for 15-20 minutes to thicken up. The mix should have thickened up substantially before you add it to the meat.
Mix the eggs and the meat well. Add and mix the bread-broth mixture with the meat. Continue to mix for several minutes until the meat starts to form a sticky film on the sides of your mixing bowl. A kitchen aid for the mixing works really well and makes it low effort. Let it stand in the fridge for at least 10 minutes.
In the meantime, fry a test meatball to see that the spicing is as you want it. Adjust as needed. Make sure your spice level and saltiness is as preferred.
Wet your hands with cooking oil or cold water and shape the meatballs. Smaller is bettter than bigger.
Pan fry the meatballs on medium heat, keep moving the around so they get evenly cooked. After 5 minutes, check for doneness.

Dip your hands in the ice water to get them wet and colder. With the wet hands form the meatballs. They should be fairly small - say 1" in diameter.

Brown Gravy - Roux based

Make a roux with flour in the frying pan and the remaining grease. Stir the roux over medium heat until it has changed color. It should turn golden brown. Add some of the beef stock to the frying pan and dissolve the roux. Pour the mix back into the broth pot. Simmer it on medium heat.

If you need to thicken up the gravy use some potato starch or potato flour. I am a big fan of using potato starch as this nicely thickens up the gravy without affecting the flavor. An alternative to potato starch is to make more roux.

Great options to add a little more character to the gravy are to add some Worcestershire sauce, a tbsp of soy, and a little bit of yellow mustard.

Adjust the gravy until you have the consistency and flavor that you want. If you need more saltiness then add a tsp of soy.

White Gravy

(dairy free, gluten free)

Designed for pasta and Swedish meatballs

Ingredients

• 2 tbsp neutral fat, butter alternative, or olive oil

• 1 small onion or 1 shallot, very finely minced

• 1½ tbsp gluten-free flour or starch, rice flour preferred, cornstarch works

• 1½ cups good beef stock, warm

• ¾ to 1 cup dairy-free cream, oat cream is closest, cashew cream works

• Salt, to taste

• White pepper, to taste

• ½ to 1 tsp gluten-free soy sauce, optional but recommended

• Pinch of sugar, optional

Method

1. Heat fat over medium-low heat.
2. Add onion and cook gently until fully soft and translucent. No browning.
3. Sprinkle in flour or starch. Stir continuously for 30 to 60 seconds.
4. Slowly whisk in warm beef stock until smooth.
5. Optional: if you prefer a completely smooth gravy, then use your immersion/stick blender.
6. Add cream alternative and bring to a gentle simmer.
7. Cook until the sauce coats a spoon.
8. Season with salt and white pepper.
9. Add GF soy drop by drop until the flavor is rounded, not soy-forward.
10. Add a tiny pinch of sugar only if the sauce tastes flat or bitter.

Texture notes

For pasta, stop just short of gravy thickness. It should cling and flow, not mound.

Optional pan version, recommended

Brown the meatballs first. Remove them. Build the sauce in the same pan using the fond, then return the meatballs to the sauce before serving. This matters more than any extra seasoning.

What if?

Mistakes do happen - this is how you deal with the most common metballs mistakes

Mistakes happen. Thankfully mistakes when making meatballs can easily be remedied. Below you will find some common mistakes and how to correct them.

The meat is too finely ground, or too wet after adding the broth-bread mixture, so that the meatballs are hard to shape.
Fix 1: If you mix it more, this time take out your KitchenAid, you will extract myosin that will bind the meat together better.

Fix 2 : Add flour to a plate. Put enough meat for a meatball in the flour. Cover the meat with flour. Pick it up and brush off the flour. It should now have enough coating to be shaped into a ball. It does not have to be perfect. When you drop it into the boiling broth the ball with quickly form.

The test meatball taste too gamey?
Fix: Try adding a tablespoon of heavy cream to the meatballs. You can carefully add more but continue to make more test meatballs until you are happy. Too much cream can make the mixed meat too liquid (see fix 1. above)
Also: Remember to take better care next time you process the animal. Gamey taste is the fault of the hunter or the one who processed the meat.

The meatballs fall apart too easily.
Fix: Depending on the meat this can happen. Pork, venison, rabbit and moose all differ in how moist the raw meat is and how it stays together. After some practice you will get a feel for how the consistency of the mixed meat should be. Here are some advice in the meantime:
Fix 1: Mix the meat more -- see myosin note above.
Fix 2: Try next time to decrease the breadcrumb/broth mix or even skip breadcrumbs altogether.
Fix 3: Adding some potato flour or potato starch to the mix will bind it without affecting the flavor.
Fix 4: Cook them only in the oven instead of pan-frying them. Once they have color, turn them gently with a spoon once. Once the other side has color too it should be ready. Estimated time in 350°F is 20+ minutes. Try one meatball and make sure it is cooked through.
The meatballs are too dry
Fix 1: Add a fatty liquid, heavy cream, or oatley milk, and add some ground pork or pork fat to it. Be careful not to add too much. The pork can easily overpower the gentle flavor of moose, venison, and jackrabbit.

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