Traditional Prawn or Lamb Rissoles Saganaki
Prawn Saganaki is Greece’s famous seafood dish featuring prawns (or we prefer lamb Rissoles) drenched in a fresh juicy tomato sauce and melted Feta cheese.
It’s ideal as a starter or you can serve it as a main with some rice, pasta or just a big chunk of crunchy Greek bread that is ideally dipped into that rich salsa!
Our recipe below serves 4!
Ingredients for the Sause:
- 1/4 x cup olive oil
- 1 x red onion finely chopped
- 4 x cloves garlic, finely chopped
- ¼ cup of white wine
- 400 grams pureed tomatoes (double for More Sauce)
- 1 x tablespoon tomato paste
- 1/4 cup freshly chopped parsley
- 2 x teaspoons dried oregano
- Salt and pepper to taste
- 150 grams feta cheese
Method
*Heat the olive oil in a large heavy pan on medium heat. Add the chopped onion and fry till golden brown. Add the garlic and fry that a little too.
*Add the tomato puree, wine, tomato paste, oregano, salt, and pepper. Allow to boil and then reduce temperature to medium-low. Simmer for around 10 minutes.
*Add lamb Rissoles, see below.
*Turn off heat and crumble the Feta on top. Transfer the pan to an oven or under a hot grill until the Feta melts.
*Garnish with herbs or sliced scallions and serve with rosemary bread and salad or with mashed potatoes, pasta, or rice.
Hot Tip
The first thing you are going to do with this recipe is season your oil. Seasoning your oil with garlic and onion before you add other ingredients is a great trick to keep in your back pocket! When you fry these first, the oil absorbs the flavours more fully, which helps the flavours mix into the rest of the ingredients. Hot Tip: put the onion in the pan before your fry your garlic. This helps prevent the garlic from burning since it cooks faster than onions.
This dish is fabulous with lots of sauce. Just add another can of pureed tomatoes and follow the instructions, cooking the sauce (in a pot) until slightly thickened. Taste and adjust the seasoning as needed. If making a larger batch in a pot, you can skip the broiler step and just allow the feta cheese to soften from the heat of the sauce.
Ingredients For Meat Balls:
- 500 grams premium beef or lamb mince.
- 1 medium onion, quartered
- 1 whole garlic clove
- ¾ cup bread crumbs, unseasoned
- ½ cup whole milk
- 1 large egg
- ¼ cup grated parmesan cheese
- ¼ cup chopped parsley, or more
- 1 teaspoon dried crushed oregano
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper, or to taste
- Pinch crushed red pepper flakes
- Oil for frying
Meat Ball Instructions:
- Begin by making the meatballs.
- Place the garlic in the food processor and pulse until minced. Add the onion and pulse until very finely chopped.
- Add the parsley and pulse until finely chopped and combined with the onion and garlic.
- Whisk the milk and egg together.
- Combine the ground beef, onion, garlic, bread crumbs, parmesan and all of the ingredients in a large mixing bowl.
- Mix well with your clean hands until combined.
- Cover the mixture with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least one hour up to overnight if you can. This allows all of the flavours to really come together. I have made these in a hurry without refrigerating the mixture and it comes out very good.
- Form the meatballs into round golf ball sized pieces.
- Heat oil in a frying pan. I like to use a cast iron pan since it retains heat very well.
- Place the meatballs on a baking tray and bake in the oven at 230°C for 5-6 minutes on each side or until golden brown. They do not have to cook all the way through since they will continue to cook in the sauce. Just get a nice brown colour around them.