Let’s start at the beginning. In the beginning was a head of broccoli. Do you like broccoli? Me too. I don’t always find this vegetable at the market, or in as fresh condition as I would like, but when I do, I get a vision of those vibrantly green florets parboiled to a tender crunch, with straw mushroom and medallions of carrot here and there, and between the gaps glimpses of a sheen of grease over slightly thickened stock. Chop suey is right.
Alas, it was not meant to be. The lure of trying out something new proved stronger. I’m talking parmesan broccoli balls, the recipe of which called for “stuffing mix.” What’s that? Obviously I’m a sucker for such challenges. In fact, it was what it sounded like: the kind you stuff a turkey with, basically a mix of old bread and spices, except in this case it was used as a coating for the broccoli. Long story short, here’s how they looked straight out of the oven:
Without passing judgment on the recipe — I improvised, after all — let me just say that there was too much breading mixture left, so I baked that into balls as well. They are the ones you see alongside the pasta in the topmost photo. Don’t be fooled; the dish is a pile of carbs upon carbs, absolutely no broccoli there. The question that remains is whether those faux meatballs tasted anything like what they looked like, or at least any good. Whaddya know — they kind of did/were! For the record, I wish that weren’t the case, but there it is, and I had to restrain myself from eating more than a forkful. The problem with beginnings is that they have to have endings. I should’ve stuck with chop suey.
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