Recipe
Up your meatball game with this traditional Mexican meatballs recipe
Warm, comforting and packed with smoky spice, these traditional Mexican meatballs are a hearty everyday favourite.
By Daniella Guevara Muñoz
In Spanish, albóndigas simply means ‘meatballs’. If you’re used to Italian meatballs, this dish comes with atip warning due to the spice kick you get with the smoky chipotle chilli (dried and smoked jalapeño chillies). Albóndigas is an everyday dish, not fancy but very tasty. You commonly see this on the daily special for lunch – the main meal in Mexico.
The meatballs are generally made with spearmint, but this is not always available, so for this recipe we used regular mint. Albóndigas are generally served with rice and corn tortillas, and they are at their best when you make your own tortillas. This is a great winter warmer dish.
Serves 4
Ingredients to make traditional Mexican meatballs recipe
Meatballs
50 g (1 3⁄4 oz) stale bread roll (1 day old is fine)
1⁄2 cup (125 ml) full-cream (whole) milk
4 whole allspice
2 garlic cloves
8 large mint leaves
1 tablespoon table salt
500 g (1 lb 2 oz) regular minced (ground) beef (not super lean)
1 large egg
2 hard-boiled eggs
Sauce
750 g (1 lb 10 oz) ripe tomatoes, cut into chunks
1⁄2 white onion, cut into chunks
2 garlic cloves
100 g (3 1⁄2 oz) tinned chipotle in adobo salt, to taste
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
250 ml (1 cup) vegetable, beef or chicken stock
To serve
White rice
Corn tortilla
How to make traditional Mexican meatballs recipe
Start by soaking the bread for the meatballs with the milk in a bowl until soft. For the sauce, add the tomato, onion, garlic, chillies and salt to a blender or food processor and process until smooth. Place a large cast-iron pot on the stovetop, add the oil and set the heat to medium.
Add the sauce and stock and bring to a simmer, then cook for about 10 minutes. Make sure the sauce does not get too dry – add water if needed. While the sauce is simmering, make the meatballs. Place the allspice, garlic and mint in a molcajete or mortar and pestle with the salt and pound to a paste.
Place the beef in a large bowl and add the spice paste and soaked bread (do not include the milk in the bowl). Lightly beat the large raw egg in a cup and add this to the mixture. Mix all the ingredients with your hands until even. Peel the boiled eggs and cut each one into eight cubes. Grab a portion of the meatball mixture and make a small patty. Place a piece of egg in the middle and form a meatball about the size of a golf ball.
Three to four meatballs per person is the goal. (I generally have a few egg pieces left at the end.) Add the meatballs to the simmering sauce as you make them, then cook for about 30 minutes. Place the albóndigas in a large dish (or serve straight from the pan) and serve with white rice and warm corn tortillas.
Images and text from Provecho by Daniella Guevara Munoz, photography by Simon Bajada. Murdoch Books RRP $45.00. Citro may receive a small commission at no cost to you on any orders placed using the book link in this article.
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