Fay's Soutzoukakia in tomato sauce

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Soutzoukakia is a special Greek dish with minced meat and red sauce accompanied with French fries or rice.

INGREDIENTS:

Half a kilo of minced lamb meat

4 slices of bread

1 cup of olive oil

5 squashed tomatoes or a spoonful of tomato paste and a box of tomato juice

1 spoonful of cumin

4-5 smashed garlic cloves

Salt

Pepper

A cup of water

Preparation:

We put the bread in a bowl of water and when it's all wet we remove the water and the bread's crust and we add the minced meat, the cumin, the garlic, the salt and pepper and we mix well with our hands until we have a unified mixture. We take small quantities of the mixture and create long, narrow pieces that look like small sausages.

There are two ways of pre-baking soutzoukakia. The traditional way is to fry them in a pan of hot olive oil. The second way is to grill them lightly in the oven.

 In a large saucepan add the oil on med heat soften onion and garlic add the tomatoes and a glass of water, salt, pepper and some cumin seed and a pinch of sugar.

After the sauce is boiled and has thickened add the soutzoukakia in the mixture and after 15 minutes (in medium temperature) the food is ready to be enjoyed. You can add green olives inside the sauce to add a special flavour.

You can either serve with rice or mashed potatoes or your favourite pasta. Enjoy!