Old favourites never go out of fashion.

Growing up, one of my favourite meals ever to come out of the kitchen was meatballs. It didn’t matter what sort of meatballs; beef, lamb, pork or chicken with any combination of herbs, spices or vegetables mixed in, it didn’t matter. although they did seem to taste even better when I was involved in creating these round morsels of yumminess.

Then for some unknown reason meatballs seemed to disappear from the family repertoire. I don’t know why this happened or when it happened, they just stopped making an appearance at dinner time. I refer to this time as the missing meatball era, and vowed that it would never be repeated with my family.

In fact the missing meatball era has resulted in the humble meatball claiming a prized place in the Brogan household. Meatballs became the meal that was shared more than any other, it could be the sharing was in the making, with all hands on deck to roll them, or the meal that was served to bring the family together, or just shared with friends.

So in the spirit of sharing – and maybe starting a national meatball Monday campaign I have included a basic meatball and tomato sauce recipe to kick you off.

Recipe serves 4

500g lean minced beef

1tsp dried parsley

pinch of salt & pepper

Mix all ingredients together and form into tablespoon sized pieces. (chilling for 30 minutes help them keep their shape)

Sauce

1 cup beef stock

1 tbsp plain flour

1 can chopped tomatoes

1 small bunch of basil

1/2 cup grated mozzerella

Mix flour to a paste with a little of the stock, add to a pan with tomatoes. Bring to the boil. Simmer.

Meanwhile fry the meatballs until cooked through, pour over the sauce, add basil and server topped with cheese.