Asian Meatballs

In our household we adore Chinese dumplings.  But they are an ENORMOUS amount of WORK.  All that rolling and crimping and stuff takes forever, which makes it totally impractical as a weeknight meal.  However, sometimes you just gotta have that flavor, so I got the bright idea to try adapting my dumpling filling into a meatball.  I served these over an experiment–my sesame noodles made with rice noodles, but the noodle package was in Chinese, so I didn’t cook them long enough.  The noodles were a fail, but the meatballs were a total win.  Hubby declared these a keeper.  Per meatball it comes out at 71.39 calories and  4.9 g  of fat.

Ingredients

  • 1 lb ground pork
  • 3 scallions (just the green part)
  • 1/2 cup caned bamboo shoots
  • 1 cup bok choy
  • 1 tsp freshly grated ginger
  • 2 Tbs soy sauce
  • 1/2 tsp kosher salt
  • 2 Tbs cornstarch
  • 1 Tbs rice wine (or dry sherry)
  • 1/4 cup breadcrumbs

Directions:

1. Preheat your oven to broil (if your oven is like mine, it doesn’t beep when it’s at temp for broil).
2. Add everything but the bread crumbs to your food processor.
3. Pulse the mixture until well blended.
4. Add the breadcrumbs (obviously if you’re gluten free you need to use gluten free bread crumbs).
5. Pulse until just combined.
6. Carefully remove the blade and set aside.
7. Line a large cookie sheet with parchment paper.
8. Scoop out globs of meat and roll into a loose ball.  Mine were about an inch to inch and a half across.
9. I got 20 meatballs out of this batch.  You could go bigger or smaller, depending on your preference, just keep an eye on your cooking time.
10. Cook for 10-15 minutes or until a meat thermometer inserted in the center reads at least 165 degrees.
11. Serve with your preference of side (fried rice, stir fried veggies, or sesame noodles).

Printable version.

3 thoughts on “Asian Meatballs

    1. I’ve never used beef, but I’ve absolutely used ground turkey or chicken to great success in my dumplings, so I see no reason why they shouldn’t translate here.

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