[ recipe ] :: classic meatballs

Oh my goodness - I have never had a more delicious meatball, so I had to share this Easy Freezer Meal Meatball recipe from One Hundred Dollars a Month. I am horrible about following recipes, but I followed this one to a "T" and I'm so glad that I did.

Last weekend, The Hubs and I picked up 40 pounds of glorious 93% lean beef from Zaycon Foods. We spent a few hours on Saturday morning cooking and freezing the beef, and decided it would be nice to have nine pounds of meatballs saved for future meals. In case you were wondering, that makes 140 meatballs and uses about 5 pounds of ground beef.

I doubled the original recipe (it uses just 2.5 pounds of beef), but it can easily be sized-down to make a more manageable portion. Here is my take on the recipe to make about 1 pound of meatballs  - we made each meatball out of 1 ounces of meat, making each serving 4 1-oz meatballs.

This recipe is perfect for a weekend meal, or you could double it to have meatballs for dinner later in the week!

Ingredients
 Makes about 16 1-ounce meatballs - serves 4

1/2 lb lean ground beef
1 egg
1/4 cup milk
1/4 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
1/2 cup Italian breadcrumbs
1 tsp minced garlic (about 1 large clove)
1/2 of a yellow onion, minced (I ran mine through the food processor)
1/4 tsp oregano + a pinch to taste
1/4 tsp pepper + a pinch to taste
1/2 tsp salt

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, combine all of the ingredients and mix well - using your hands works best. Wet your hands with water before forming the meatballs to keep the mixture from sticking to your hands. Use a kitchen scale to weigh out 1 ounce meatballs, or approximate the size by making them about 1.5" in diameter (a little smaller than a golf ball). Place on a cookie sheet or baking dish and bake for 30 minutes, or until cooked through.

We made so many of these at once that it took a bit longer to bake - about an hour. Take the meatballs out of the oven after 30 minutes and "sacrifice" one by cutting it in half to see if it is cooked through. Try not to eat them immediately!

We had these meatballs for lunch the other day and they are so tender and full of flavor! The Hubs and I smothered them in a spicy-sweet barbeque sauce and had them alongside a broccoli-cheese rice pilaf. They only took 2 minutes to heat up in the microwave, making them perfect for quick lunches and dinners.

I promise, these are the most perfect meatballs you will ever taste - you'll never be able to have pre-made meatballs from the freezer section of the grocery store ever again.

- Maggie White