LOL.
Thinking I’d make a 2/3 batch, the first thing I did was pull from the fridge the pound of ground pork which I thawed for two days, all the while thinking it was chicken. This was at 5:00 last night. So, I found a half-pound of frozen ground chicken, and thawed it in the micro-wave. I had read the blog post you linked to referring to The Japanese Grill, a cookbook which I used to have and respect. In the blog post she explained how Ono and Salat recommend cooking a portion of the Tsukune meat first to prevent shrinkage. So, when the edges of my ground chicken were cooked in the process of thawing, I didn’t fret about it. Thanks for that.
This gave me the amount of meat needed for the full recipe. I decided to skip the skewer and grill issues (in the wake of all my indecision, pondering, hesitations and waffling, DH had already renamed this dish Shiitfukee Balls) and used the oven. I made 12 large-ish meatballs (#14 cookie scoop) out of the full recipe, and roasted at 425 for 25 minutes. Then I basted with the tare and stuck under the broiler for 2-3 minutes, basting at 1 minute intervals.
They came out great. Tender and juicy. I should add I did knead the meat mixture, as recommended in the blog post for keeping skewered meat together. It’s a habit of mine to overwork meatballs in any case, carried over from sausage making, I guess. I agree it helps keep things together.
Results and photo posted on WFD here.
Will be interested to hear what route you take!
