Herby Garlicy Tasty Turkey Meatballs with Zucchini Spirals
Serves: 4
Time: 30 minutes
Turkey mince is one protein that most people don’t seem to use a lot. I used to be a bit turkey shy because the colour put me off, but once I started to use it, I was completely changed and now It gets cooked up in our house a lot. It’s a lean meat but takes on flavours really well. Tonight it is getting mixed with pork to add a little juiciness, but pork mince is also relatively lean so cook time is very fast. Be careful not to overcook these bad boys as you don’t want to end up with a dry meatball. There is a lot of garlic in this meal, so the flavour is fabulous. I love all the health benefits to eating garlic but garlic can be a little rough of the tummy so if you are a touch-sensitive just go with 1 garlic clove in the meatballs and cut back on the garlic slithers as well.
Leftovers
This mix makes plenty of meatballs so you have ample for leftovers and for a bit of variety try turning them into a meatball wrap (like a meatball sub but less bread).
Make Your Own or Buy Precut Zucchini Spirals
I broke my little spiral tool on a carrot, so I tend to just use my juilienne peeler to make spirals but they have them already made nowdays in most of the supermarkets, so this week I cheated and to my surprise they were incredibly fresh and actually perfect so I think I'll be cheating from now on.
What you'll need
500g turkey mince
500g pork mince
1 egg
1/2 bunch dill
1/4 bunch of parsley
6 cloves of garlic
1 packet of cherry tomatoes
1/2 bunch baby rocket
4 zucchini or pre-cut zucchini spirals
25g butter
From the Pantry
olive oil
salt and pepper
Optional Lunch Extras
grated cheese
leftover tortillas
mayo
Prep and Cook
Preheat Oven to 180c
Make Meatballs
Peel and grate garlic into a large mixing bowl.
Roughly chop dill and parsley and add to the garlic along with the turkey and pork mince, loads of cracked pepper, salt and 1 egg.
Mix all together really well then mould into balls about the size of a golf ball.
Line a baking tray with paper and place balls on the tray making sure that they don’t touch each other.
Cook in the oven for 15 minutes.
Cook Garlic
Slice garlic into nice thin slithers.
Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a frypan, sauté the garlic until it starts to turn a light translucent white. Add the cherry tomatoes and the butter and shake the pan regularly so the tomatoes are getting cooked on all sides.
Turn the heat down and leave to very gently cook until the tomatoes have split.
Toss Together
Don't Overcrowd
It's a good habbit to learn not to overcrowd your fry pans regardless of what you are cooking if you overcrowd your pan food tends to sweat and go all mushy instead of "frying" and turning out still lush and colourful.
Once the meatballs are out of the oven, turn up the frypan and toss the meatballs through the garlic butter, working them around a bit so that they are nicely coated and brown up a little on the outside.
Depending on how big your fry pan is, you can either add the zucchini spirals into the pan or heat up a separate pan with a touch of olive oil and toss quickly for roughly 30 seconds (just long enough to get some heat).
Season with salt and pepper and throw a couple of large handfuls of the rocket through then transfer immediately to serving dishes.
Plate it Pretty
This one is a very simple dish so not much of a pretty dinner as such. You can serve meatballs either to the side or all mixed through with a wedge of lemon. And it was much easier to eat this one from a bowl.
Lunch tomorrow
I made our leftover meatballs into wraps using up the last of the tortillas. Heat the balls up in the microwave with a little grated cheese, a touch of mayo on the wrap and any other goodies you might have in the fridge, like spinach or rocket or tomato.