Makes four servings. Total prep time is about an hour and a half.

Ingredients:

1 pound ground lamb

half a cup of fresh breadcrumbs

1 tablespoon of Kabsa

1 tablespoon of dried ground lemon

1 tablespoon of parsley

1 teaspoon of salt

A tablespoon of unsalted butter

olive oil to cover the bottom of the pan

Details:

I used grass-fed lamb. This was available in my local grocery store in the organic section. I used two pieces of week-old Italian bread from the Publix bakery. The Kabsa is a spice blend found at an Middle-Eastern grocery. I bought the dried ground lemon from an Ethiopian market. I used plain dried parsley, but fresh would be good too, if you avoid the stems. I used Himalayan pink salt and ground it up with a mortar and pestle.

Instructions:

Mix the breadcrumbs, Kabsa, ground lemon, parsley, and salt together. I did it all in the food processor because I’d used that to render the bread.

Put the ground lamb into a large bowl that has a lid. Add the breadcrumb and spice mix. Mix together thoroughly using your hands. Leave as a big lump in the bowl and put the lid on the bowl. Let it sit in the refrigerator for an hour.

When it is time to cook, add the butter first to a large deep sauté pan and let it melt at medium-high heat. Then add the olive oil, making sure that it covers the entire pan. You don’t want the meatballs swimming in it – this is not a deep-fryer – but you also don’t want bare patches. Select a pan that is wide enough that the meatballs do not touch.

Form the meatballs with your hands, and add them to the pan. You want to heat the meatballs so they are seared and brown on the outside, but still moist (yet cooked through) on the inside. Thus, use medium-high heat at first, rotating the meatballs to sear the outside. Lower the heat a couple of notches after about five minutes. Rotate the meatballs every five minutes or so.

When done, drain on a plate that has several layers of paper towel.

Serve as is, or with a tzatziki sauce.