Homemade Meatballs

I know.  It's not a vegetarian recipe.

 I do have to cook meals (with meat) for the rest of the family.  They will only eat so much (actually, very little) of my vegetarian meals.  It can be difficult to make meals with meat since I don't taste test what I am cooking.  I usually have to hunt down a willing child to be my sampler.  Luckily, that isn't that hard in this house.

I make these meatballs for the rest of the family and they just love them.  I thought I would share them here.

I got this recipe out of a magazine and, of course, have embellished it go with whatever we have on hand.  I will post some of the changes that I have made after I give you the recipe.

Here it is:

Yummy Meatballs

1 lb ground beef
1 lb ground turkey
1 lb ground pork
1 (10 oz pkg) frozen chopped spinach, thawed, drained and squeezed dry
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
3 large eggs, beaten
2 T Italian seasoning
2 t garlic powder
1 t  red pepper flakes
1/2 cup fine bread crumbs or panko bread crumbs

Oven 400.  Coat 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.*

Mix together all ingredients.

Gently roll into 1" balls and arrange on baking sheets.

Bake until lightly browned and cooked through.  About 20-25 minutes.


My notes about the recipe:

*I use parchment paper.  The parchment paper will soak up some of the juices/fat (easier clean up, too).  (Thanks, Steve!)  You can also use non-cooking spray for this instead of the parchment paper.

I don't always make a full batch.  I will use only one pound of meat(turkey or beef) and make a smaller amount. 

I have also used fresh spinach for this recipe.  Great if you can run it through the food processor.  Makes it a lot easier to handle.

Don't have bread crumbs?  Try throwing some oats into your food processor and using this as a substitute.  It's definitely good for you (have you looked at the ingredients on a package/box of bread crumbs lately?  You can't pronounce half of those ingredients!)  So, yes, oats as a substitute for bread crumbs.  Try it.

Oh, yea, sometimes (well, a lot of times) I use fresh garlic instead of garlic powder.  Sometimes I use both.

Let me know if you try them.  Would love to know how they turn out.

Enjoy!