italiano! (bring on the meatballs!)

Mmm, mmm, good. Vegetarians, look away!

Since getting back from Christmas break, we've been slowly but surely getting back into the swing of things. We didn't have very long to do that, though!
I had to bounce right back into work upon arrival, and Dusty started his one-week intensive session the following Monday.


One of the best parts of being back has been recipe searching, and meal planning. And the first week we were back, it was time for meatballs!

I found a great recipe. Given that I had just seen that my sister-in-law had made some homemade meatballs, this recipe came along just at the right time! I was craving a pasta night. :)
HEALTH ALERT:
These meatballs contain flaxseed, which has high levels of dietary fiber and is great for all-around health!
While some flaxseed recipes are no good, we both really enjoyed these little guys!

I found the original recipe online, at momlogic.com :)

Beefaball a la Parm
(parmesan meatballs!)

Ingredients:

1 pound lean ground turkey (we used BEEF!)

1/4 cup finely chopped onion

1 tbsp. ground flaxseed

2 egg whites

1/2 cup bread crumbs

¼ cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese

1 tsp. garlic powder

½ tsp. dried oregano

1 tbsp. dried parsley (we used fresh)

½ tsp. dried basil

A pinch of salt

1 tbsp. olive or canola oil

Directions:
(easy peasy!)

1. Mix all ingredients together with your hands.

2. Roll into 1 1/2inch balls.

3. Heat 1T oil in large skillet. Add meatballs and brown on all sides.

 

 

4. Add desired sauce to pan, homemade or otherwise!



5. Cook about 20 minutes or until meatballs are no longer pink on the inside.

6. Serve over cooked pasta! (we used bowtie, which is my favorite!)



Little known fact: I used to eat uncooked pasta all the time! Yum.

 7. Enjoy!

The flavors of this really come together nicely, especially the parmesan within the meatballs. We cut the meatballs in half, and melty parmesan was there to greet us. It was delish!

EFFICIENCY ALERT:

Realizing we had many leftover meatballs, we decided to make some pita pizzas!

Pita Pita Pumpkin Eata

(Pita Meatball Pizzas!)

Ingredients:

-Pita Bread
-Desired sauce (marinara, yum!)
-Parmesan cheese
-Mozarella cheese (shredded)
-Leftover meatballs (chopped up!)
-Fresh parsley
-Fresh ground pepper

-Whatever-you-want, and lots of it!

Directions:

Take pita bread, (ours came pre-sliced in halves), and smother with sauce, cheese, veggies, meatballs, cheese, pepper, cheese, and so on and so forth.
Have a pizza-topping-riot.

Put mini pizzas on a baking sheet, and stick in the oven for as long as you want. :)
We threw 'em in there at around 375 or so.

Since none of our ingredients were raw, we just kept an eye on them until they were bubbly and delicious!

I have SUCH a great helper! :)



YUM!

Be creative with your leftovers.

And now that we have all this cheese, be looking forward to many more parmesan/mozarella themed dinners :)



In love,

Cait