Baked Chicken Meatballs

Well.... you would think that having time off would mean a relaxing day or two.... NOT in my house!  Today Avery went to daycare, so my mom and I went shopping, shopping, shopping.  Michaels, Costco, Dollar store, home for lunch, a few crafts, pick up Avery, Walmart trip, home to make dinner.  After all of that, what did I make for dinner?  Baked Chicken Meatballs!

I had seen the recipe on Pinterest (no surprise there) and I wanted to make them yesterday; however, I did not have any bacon!  If a recipe calls for bacon, you CANNOT make it without the bacon! LOL.  The recipe was pretty easy, as usual I made a few changes, but they were/are DELICIOUS.  Avery did not eat hers, but she did not eat a thing on her plate this evening!

Ingredients

1. 1 lb ground free range chicken, or 2 boneless skinless chicken breasts cut into strips and pulsed in a food processor until ground  - I used ground turkey, and i didnt quite have 1lb
2. 1 small yellow onion, diced - forgot to buy this so i skipped it
3. 1 clove garlic, minced - being lazy i used the pre-diced stuff in the fridge
4. 3 strips bacon, diced - I may have used 6 slices :-)
5. 1 egg yolk
6. 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil - whoops, forgot to measure this
7. 2 tablespoons homemade tomato sauce - I used tomato paste
8. 3 tablespoons chopped Italian parsley - or as much as you would like
9. Oh I added mushrooms too!!

 

 

1. Preheat your oven to 400º and place a rack in the upper third of your oven.
2. In a medium skillet over medium heat, add the diced bacon and cook until a good amount of fat has been rendered out, about 1 tablespoon or so.    - this is where i added mushrooms
3. Add the diced onion and the garlic and cook until the onion is translucent and the bacon is crispy.  Remove from the heat and cool slightly. meh- i just dumped them in my meat mixture
4. Combine the ground chicken, egg yolk, 1 tablespoon of tomato sauce, parsley and the bacon, onion and garlic in a large bowl.   
5. Season with salt and pepper and mix well.   whoops, i forgot this too!
6. Form meatballs and roll into little balls, about 1 tablespoon of mixture per ball.  Place the formed meatballs into a large baking dish about one inch apart.  I lined my baking dish with aluminum foil and sprayed it with olive oil - I like an easy clean up
7. Combine 1 tablespoon of olive oil and 1 tablespoon of tomato sauce together in a small bowl and brush on top of each meatball.  Pop into your preheated oven, and bake for 15 minutes. my sauce was quite a bit thicker than what seemed to be in the original recipe, but i quite enjoyed it!

Original Recipe: http://dandydishes.blogspot.ca/2011/06/baked-chicken-meatballs.html#.UTFoyhk-Ote

Hope you enjoy them!!

JoJo!!