Food processor love

With the exception of my microwave oven, I had pretty much had a Luddite kitchen. I own good knives. I also have my trusty wooden bowls and chopping knives.

Last Passover I did all of the cooking for Seder at  our friend Bill's house in Philadelphia. Bill is a pretty basic cook. it was something of a challange producing meals for crowds given the cooking tools in his kitchen. He did however have a food processor. I had never used one before. I know, they have been avaialble to the public since the late 1970's. Yes, I am a late adopter. But I can make a really good meal under really primitive conditions.

I realized really quicxkly that a food processor is in fact a great thing. as soon as we got home from Bill's, I ran out and bought myself a food processor. I even got us a new one for Passover use.


When my big kids were little, I used to make what I called "meatballs with stealth vegetables". I used to chop away at a mess of vegetables until they were an unidentifiable puree, and add them to the chopped meat. Chopping all of those vegetables was a big job. It was worth it though, because my not particularly vegetable enamored kids would gobble up those meat balls.  Yes, they knew the vegetables were in there. Eventually they began to request particular stealth veggies. My older son was particularly fond of winter root vegetables, like parsnips and parsley root. Often the vegetable content was greater than the meat content. But my kids ate away.

My youngest is even more vegetable resistant than his older sibs. I made this meat loaf with him in mind. I processed a large package of mushrooms and a head of celery. The mushrooms and celery cooked have a vaguely meaty taste.  The food processor made the  job of chopping a quick one. Five  minutes as opposed to 30 . I cooked the vegetable slurry in the microwave for 5 minutes with a pouring of red wine left over from last Friday night. The mixture was about equal in volume to the chopped meat. I mixed the meat and veggies with matza meal, a couple of eggs and a bunch of different Middle Eastern spice mixes. In order to be sure that my youngest will eat the meatloaf, I will drizzle the meat loaf with barbeque sauce when I heat it up.

Don't you just love my circa 1940 enamelwear pan? I love how totally silly the meat looks against the pink enamel.

The meatloaf will be served with string beans roasted with olive oil annd salt.This is also a vintage baking pan., The white is not as cute as the pink, but it does the job. I will add some fresh leomon juice to the beans before I serve them. A salad will round out the meal. No guests are joining us, so I will skip dessert making. Challa baked last week will be served as well.