18-04-2025
Easter With a Chance of Meatballs
Good morning. We were driving under slate gray skies through a landscape of dun fields and naked trees when, suddenly, the sun broke through and there was color everywhere: spring, sprung. It felt like a kind of miracle, as if we were present for the exact moment when the natural world was awakening from wintertime slumber to push upward into green, into yellow, into life.
Of course this made me think about dinner. (Everything makes me think about dinner.) My thought process was simplistic word association. Spring, rebirth, lamb. And a specific lamb at that: this recipe for lamb meatballs with spiced tomato sauce (above) that I dug out of the Los Angeles chef Suzanne Goin's indispensable cookbook, 'Sunday Suppers at Lucques,' a long time ago, and return to time and again.
It's a simple meal of crisp meatballs floating in a fragrant tomato gravy of North African origins, run through with orange juice and warm spices, anointed with feta and mint. It pairs well with pita and couscous. The labor's serial and not at all difficult, which makes it perfect cooking for a Saturday afternoon. Fire up the radio while you cook. The Yankees play the Rays in Tampa just after 4 p.m.
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Will there be glazed ham on the table on Sunday, with scalloped potatoes and loads of asparagus? There sure could be. That's an Easter tradition where I stay. But you might consider this new recipe from Genevieve Ko for lemon butter salmon with dill instead, topped with quick-pickled cucumbers and mustard seeds. Take a look at Sue Li's recipe for a carrot tart with ricotta and feta, too.
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