Name: nourishing polpette & orzo in basic broth
Ingredients: 1 (46-ounce) can chicken broth; 1 (1-ounce) slice Italian bread; 1/2 cup milk; 1 pound ground sirloin; 1/2 cup minced fresh onion ((about 3 ounces)); 1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese, divided ((about 2 ounces)); 1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley, divided; 1/4 teaspoon salt; 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper; 1 cup shredded fresh carrot ((about 2.5 ounces)); 2 cups hot al dente cooked orzo ((about 1 cup uncooked))

Polpette. Simply translated from Italian …a polpette is a meatball consisting of ground meat that is rolled into a small ball, sometimes along with other ingredients, such as bread crumbs, minced onion, eggs, grated cheese, and seasoning. Meatballs can be cooked by frying, baking, steaming, or braising in sauce. For our current bowl of goodness, we’ll be cooking the formed meatballs right in the broth. This Nourishing Polpette & Orzo in Basic Broth is not only delicious …it is all cooked in one pot. An all-around win.

Authentic polpette are generally considered to be a home-cooked dish. They can be made with a mixture of different meats, rather than just ground beef. Actually, a mixture of ground beef, pork, and veal is the ideal combination in terms of flavor and texture. This recipe is adapted from one that uses just ground beef but the combined ground meats would also be delicious. Or ground chicken, as we use in our recipe for Ina Garten’s Italian Wedding Soup. If you like, you could even use your favorite Italian sausage removed from the casings.

The prep work on this is pretty straightforward …the onion is minced, the parsley chopped and the carrot is grated along with the cheese. Be sure you don’t skip the step where you soak the bread in milk before adding it to the mix.

Keep these guys on the small side…

These meatballs will be quickly cooked directly in the broth, so you need to form them on the small side. The smaller the better.

Here in the US, we think of spaghetti and meatballs as an authentic Italian dish. That’s not really the case. In Italy, especially the southern area of the country, they sometimes enjoy very small meatballs with pasta varieties but never spaghetti. Their meatballs range in size from that of a marble to a golf ball. Never larger. And they mostly serve them on their own in a white wine sauce or a red sauce. Or in soups, as we are featuring here.

Here’s a very informative article on the history of polpette from The Atlantic. An interesting read.