chiuchow beef meat balls 潮州牛丸 - part 3

Since the success of my first attempt in making Chiuchow style beef meatballs, I have been itching to make another batch with different texture. I want to make some that is more chewy and with some bits of cow tendon. I know it would be a challenge especially I would just be using my intuitions.
I have pondered as what cut of beef to use. The options are beef shanks, brisket, or flank. What I would use will depends on what I find when I go shopping.

I decided to buy a whole brisket thinking the price is right

I picked up a pack of cow tendon - it is quite expensive compared to years ago

as a backup I also bought some untrimmed beef flank with the lining

we have the record snowfall and subfreezing temperature for 10 days which paralyzed the city; my last batch of beef meatballs came in handy for making easy to prepare meals

I begun by trimming off the excess fat off the whole brisket. It turned out the piece I selected is very fat. I trimmed off 7 pounds from the 16.3 pound of whole brisket - 43%. It make this brisket rather expensive.

7 pounds of fat trimmed off

I use the flat part of the brisket to make meatballs

I thought I would use a very coarse grinder die - this would turn out to be a big mistake

it was quite a workout to hand grind 6 pounds of brisket

I want a lot of garlic in the meatballs; fresh garlic tastes better than garlic powder

this time I used good quality fish sauce

I also added some dark soy sauce for darker colour

The tendon added a lot of work; I first have to boil them for hours to soften them, then chop them in the food processor. If you've cook cow tendons you would know it is quite hard to control the tenderness. The tendons take hours of slow braising to become tender. However once they begin to soften they can go too soft very quickly.

 mixing the tendon bits into the minced beef

I made one meatballs to check the texture and seasoning. It needs more saltiness

After adjusting the seasoning, I tried making a few meatballs.Because the grind is too coarse the meatball is too loose, resulting in rather soft and mushy texture. I knew I have to re-grind the mixture with a finer grinder die.

these are too loose so the flavors are prone to leached into the water when setting the meatballs

I decide to regrind the beef mixture with my medium die (bottom); this meat grinder is an accessory of my cake mixer

Regrinding the meat mixture took a lot of work as it is very difficult to feed the meat paste into the meat grinder. This wasted a whole hour of time. This coarse meatballs are much harder to make then the ones with smooth texture as the coarser grind of the beef does not bind as tightly to form a solid meatball. Having the meatballs falling apart is a real risk.

here is the entire batch of meatballs, about 8 pounds in total; once they are cooled and lose the surface moisture I would pack them in small portions in vacuum bags

chiuchow beef meatballs - rough texture with tendon

this bowl has the smooth texture from the batch that I made last time

i bought this 10-pound bag of fresh Vietnamese rice noodles (banh pho); i divide it up into smaller bags and freeze them; buy in bulk n save!