A Chef-Approved Tip for Better Meatballs, Inspired by a Soup Dumpling Technique

Thanks to Los Angeles-based chef David Kuo, a brilliant new hack for making meatballs has come to our attention: Enter, stock jelly.
Taking inspiration from classic xiao long bao (or soup dumpling) techniques, Chef Kuo incorporates coagulated stock in…

Thanks to Los Angeles-based chef David Kuo, a brilliant new hack for making meatballs has come to our attention: Enter, stock jelly.

Taking inspiration from classic xiao long bao (or soup dumpling) techniques, Chef Kuo incorporates coagulated stock into his meatball mixture so that—when cooked—warm, umami-rich liquid flows through each ball.

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Our 19 Favorite Ground Beef Recipes

When it comes to dinnertime, a pound of ground beef can be the start of something great. I’m thinking meatballs floating in tomato-butter sauce or minestrone soup (or even grape jelly—don’t knock it till you’ve tried it!). Or maybe smash burgers slathe…

When it comes to dinnertime, a pound of ground beef can be the start of something great. I’m thinking meatballs floating in tomato-butter sauce or minestrone soup (or even grape jelly—don’t knock it till you’ve tried it!). Or maybe smash burgers slathered with ketchup and mustard, shatteringly crisp lumpia, spicy kebabs wrapped tightly in chapati, a steaming bowl of chili with a skillet of cornbread on the side. Whichever direction your taste buds are sending you, these ground beef recipes will feed a crowd.

Some of these recipes are takes on classic dishes that swap in grains or vegetarian protein for some of the beef. And even if you’re not a meat eater at all (but have somehow found yourself reading this, a roundup of ground beef recipes), there are still options. Swap in a ground faux meat like Impossible or Beyond, which both make vegan ground “beef” offerings that would work relatively seamlessly in any of these 19 ground beef recipes.

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New Meatballs From Sohla! Which Will You Make First?

Every month, in Off-Script With Sohla, pro chef and flavor whisperer Sohla El-Waylly will introduce you to a must-know cooking technique—and then teach you how to detour toward new adventures.

I didn’t grow up with the meatballs I saw on TV. You kno…

Every month, in Off-Script With Sohla, pro chef and flavor whisperer Sohla El-Waylly will introduce you to a must-know cooking technique—and then teach you how to detour toward new adventures.


I didn’t grow up with the meatballs I saw on TV. You know, the kind that are perfectly round and covered in red sauce on a plate of spaghetti. Instead, I ate charred lamb kofta with saffron rice or pollock balls stewed in a creamy korma. That’s why I think outside the beef. With my riffable technique, any minced meat or fish can transform into flavorful, tender, and moist meatballs.

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How to Make Tender, Golden-Crisp Meatballs With Impossible Burger

We’ve teamed up with Impossible Foods to highlight delicious ideas for using their Impossible™ Burger 12-ounce pack at home. Impossible Burger is meat made from plants for people who love meat. It can be cooked just like the ground beef that comes from…

We've teamed up with Impossible Foods to highlight delicious ideas for using their Impossible™ Burger 12-ounce pack at home. Impossible Burger is meat made from plants for people who love meat. It can be cooked just like the ground beef that comes from animals—meaning you can use it to whip up burgers, chili, tacos, and more. Here, we're showing you why it's perfect for making juicy, crispy-crusted meatballs.


In my daily life, meatballs are the sixth essential food group. They’re my go-to when I need a satisfying dinner in under an hour, roasted at high heat with whatever vegetables in my crisper drawer need using up, then topped with generous spoonfuls of yogurt. They’re what I crave when all I want is to wrap myself up in a bowlful of something warm and cozy, braised in tomato sauce and served atop spaghetti or cheesy polenta.

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Summer Pesto Mini Meatball Soup.

Um how delicious is this summer pesto mini meatball soup? It’s just the cutest too. Sure, it’s in the 90s this week and might stay there for the remainder of the month, but nothing can keep me from a comforting bowl of soup. Am I right? Summer soup for me usually means chowder (and yes […]

The post Summer Pesto Mini Meatball Soup. appeared first on How Sweet Eats.

Um how delicious is this summer pesto mini meatball soup?

summer pesto mini meatball soup

It’s just the cutest too.

Sure, it’s in the 90s this week and might stay there for the remainder of the month, but nothing can keep me from a comforting bowl of soup.

Am I right?

mini chicken meatballs

Summer soup for me usually means chowder (and yes I have another one coming!) but the thought of this pesto-y, brothy bowl sounded amazing right now. 

Plus, mini meatballs!

This soup reminds me a little of my homemade spaghettios, and not just because I use the same noodles. While these tiny noodles are the best, I love how simple and flavorful the meal is. I guess it’s sort of like spaghettios, meatballs included, without the tomato sauce?!

Which means I looooove it. 

annelini pasta

I made a mini chicken meatball soup years ago and it’s still a really popular recipe here on the site. Of course, you can make these meatballs any size you’d like, but making them tiny means they are spoonable and therefore, makes the entire bowl more enjoyable. 

It’s a whole meal in a bowl, but soup!

summer pesto mini meatball soup

Here’s the deal with the pesto!

I’m including a smaller batch pesto recipe below, but you could totally use a good jarred pesto if you have one that you enjoy. This is also a recipe that you can make when you have leftover pesto, or pesto frozen from earlier in the year. As long as you’re using a pesto that you like, it will work in the soup. 

And this goes for any pesto! I’ve done kale pesto, pistachio pesto, arugula pesto and many more. All of them will work here!

summer pesto mini meatball soup with spoon

The pesto works in magic ways: we’re using it to flavor the meatballs (which is incredible!) and then we’re also stirring it into the soup. Then, you can even finish off the soup with a big dollop of it on top.

It’s the BEST way to enjoy pesto. Loaded with flavor! 

summer pesto mini meatball soup with spoon

The soup comes together pretty quickly too. You can make the pesto and even the meatballs ahead of time if you wish. You can even make a batch of meatballs and freeze them! It’s a great freezer prep meal that just requires a bit of defrosting before cooking.

And it’s ridiculously comforting, without being heavy.

summer pesto mini meatball soup with spoon

Hello dinner tonight!

summer pesto mini meatball soup

Pesto Mini Meatball Soup

Print

Summer Pesto Mini Meatball Soup

This summer pesto mini meatball soup is the perfect comfort food in warmer months! Lots of fresh basil, a delicious broth and noodles. Delish.
Course Soup
Cuisine American
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 25 minutes
Total Time 40 minutes
Servings 4 people
Author How Sweet Eats

Ingredients

small batch pesto

  • 1 cup packed fresh basil
  • ¼ cup finely grated parmesan cheese
  • 2 tablespoons pine nuts, toasted
  • 2 garlic cloves
  • pinch of crushed red pepper
  • salt and pepper
  • ½ cup extra virgin olive oil

mini meatballs & soup

  • 1 pound lean ground chicken or turkey
  • ¼ cup seasoned breadcrumbs, panko or fine crumbs both work
  • 3 tablespoons pesto
  • 2 tablespoons parmesan cheese
  • salt and pepper
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 shallot diced
  • 8 cups chicken stock or broth, low sodium is fine - you may want a pinch more salt
  • 12 ounces tiny cut pasta, like ditalini or annellini
  • fresh basil, for topping
  • shaved parmesan, for topping

Instructions

pesto

  • Place the basil, parmesan, pine nuts, garlic, red peppers flakes and a pinch of salt and pepper in the bowl of your food processor or blender. Pulse until small pieces remain. Blend while streaming in the olive oil until combined. You can store extras of this in the fridge for about a week.

mini meatballs & soup

  • In a bowl, combine the chicken/turkey with the breadcrumbs, parmesan cheese, pesto and a pinch of salt and pepper. Mix until just combined the form the mixture into mini meatballs. (Or large! Whatever you prefer!)
  • Heat a large stock pot over medium heat and add 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Add the meatballs in a single later, browning on all sides, about 8 to 10 minutes total. Remove the meatballs from the pan and place them on a plate.
  • Keep the pot over medium heat and add the remaining olive oil. Stir in the shallot with a pinch of salt and cook until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the meatballs back to the pot. Add in the broth.
  • Bring the mixture to a simmer and stir in the pasta. Cook, uncovered and stirring often, until the pasta is al dente, about 10 minutes. Taste and season with more salt and pepper if needed. Once the pasta is cooked, stir in 1 or 2 tablespoons of the pesto. (Note: the soup is not a pretty color!) Ladle the soup into bowls and the stir in more pesto on a bowl-by-bowl basis, however much you want. Garnish with shaved parmesan and extra fresh basil and serve!

up close summer pesto mini meatball soup

Garlic bread on the side please!

The post Summer Pesto Mini Meatball Soup. appeared first on How Sweet Eats.

This Cult-Favorite 1960s Dish Is Still Wildly Popular—But Why?

Grape jelly and meatballs. Sounds like two options a random word generator might spit out if programmed to a food setting. They couldn’t possibly go together, flavor-wise. Au contraire. In fact, the grape jelly meatball has been a beloved appetizer sin…

Grape jelly and meatballs. Sounds like two options a random word generator might spit out if programmed to a food setting. They couldn’t possibly go together, flavor-wise. Au contraire. In fact, the grape jelly meatball has been a beloved appetizer since at least the 1960s—and it isn’t going anywhere.

The dish is humble: Toss beef meatballs in a sauce of grape jelly and barbecue or a tomato-based chili sauce—always one prepared sauce, and always grape jelly. Stir in lemon juice, sometimes. Simmer until sticky.

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The Depression-Era Dish That Inspired My Family’s Favorite Thanksgiving Recipe

I’ve always wondered where my mom’s tomato soup meatballs came from. It’s the only recipe we make religiously every year for Thanksgiving, but each time I asked her which family member passed it down (or at the least, which cookbook she found it in), I…

I've always wondered where my mom's tomato soup meatballs came from. It's the only recipe we make religiously every year for Thanksgiving, but each time I asked her which family member passed it down (or at the least, which cookbook she found it in), I never got a solid answer—as if it had appeared out of thin air and into our kitchen.

The closest I ever got to an explanation was, "I think I might have gotten the idea from the back of Campbell's tomato soup can." To be fair, the back of a box (or in this case, can) is the source of inspiration for many passed-down family recipes, from pumpkin pie to yellow cake.

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How to Pick the Best Ground Meat From the Grocery Store

From the basic burger to the moistest meatloaf and coziest chili, ground meat is the cornerstone of so many dinner mainstays. But when was the last time you really considered your ground meat, beyond grabbing a pre-packaged pound at the grocery store? …

From the basic burger to the moistest meatloaf and coziest chili, ground meat is the cornerstone of so many dinner mainstays. But when was the last time you really considered your ground meat, beyond grabbing a pre-packaged pound at the grocery store? Well, award-winning writers and newly minted restaurateurs, Christopher Hirsheimer and Melissa Hamilton—aka The Canal House Cooks—are here to help you start looking more closely at your ground meat. They've even dedicated an entire chapter to the subject in their newest book, Canal House: Cook Something: Recipes to Rely On, on the fundamentals of cooking (plus 300 recipes that demonstrate them all).

Hirsheimer and Hamilton explain that classic American ground meat dishes were born from efficiency-and economy-optimized recipe traditions from immigrants, who actually made them with different cuts of meat entirely. Take Russian beef stroganoff, which was originally made with tender cubes of beef cooked in a mustard–sour cream sauce. In the hurried New World, it morphed into a combination of hamburger meat and condensed cream of chicken soup over noodles that its creators may not have even recognized. Ditto goulash from Hungary (originally made with cubed beef, and sometimes, heart and liver), tacos from Mexico, and ground beef lo mein adapted from the Chinese culinary tradition. Despite this, ground meat has historically made our lives easier and more affordable, and still continues to do so.

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How to Make Meatballs in 5 Simple Steps, With Any Type of Meat

Here at Food52, we love recipes—but do we always use them? Of course not. Because once you realize you don’t always need a recipe, you’ll make your favorite dishes a lot more often. Today: If you can source good ground meat, you can make meatball…

Here at Food52, we love recipes—but do we always use them? Of course not. Because once you realize you don't always need a recipe, you'll make your favorite dishes a lot more often. Today: If you can source good ground meat, you can make meatballs. Jennifer Steinhauer (a.k.a. Jenny) teaches us their ways. Photos by James Ransom. 

Meatballs are by definition not a recipe kind of food. You need some meat—about a pound of it—and you will make them into balls. They need something to bind them (that's where eggs and breadcrumbs come in), and some seasoning and flavor, especially if you are using poultry meat, as I tend to. I like to dump a lot of cheese in mine for extra yum.

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