Italian Meatballs
Recipe by Chef Heidi Fink
Heidi Fink

Italian Meatballs

  • Prep time 40 mins
  • Cook time 20 mins
  • Ready in 1 hour
  • Yield Serves 4 to 6

These delicious meatballs are quicker to make than usual and are an absolute
fabvourite of my children. The meatballs can be mixed and rolled a day or two before,
or even frozen, either raw or cooked.

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 375 F convection, or 400 F with no convection. Cover a large baking sheet (e.g. jelly roll pan) with parchment paper.
  2. Next, make a panade: a mixture of bread and dairy. Break the crustless bread into small pieces; place in a large bowl. Add the buttermilk (or milk) and mix well. Let soak for about five minutes, then mash well with a fork until the mixture resembles baby food. This will help hold moisture in the meatballs even when they are fully cooked.
  3. Add the salt to the panade and mix well.
  4. Add the ground beef and the Italian sausage meat to the panade mixture (remove casings from sausage first, if necessary). Use your hands to mix everything very well, until it is evenly blended, with no streaks of bread panade or plain sausage. (I use disposable gloves for mixing the meatballs)
  5. Divide the meatball mixture into pieces between the size of a walnut and the size of a golfball, and then roll each into a ball between your hands. Place on parchment-lined tray and place in the preheated oven for about 15 minutes, until meatballs are cooked through and browning a bit (if using a thermometer, cook meatballs until they register165 F / 74 C ).
  6. Remove from oven. They can be served as is, or better yet, added (along with all the juices) to Quick Tomato Sauce and simmered for ten to fifteen minutes.

Variations

MEATBALLS WITH TOMATO SAUCE (for pasta)

  1. Make the recipe for Quick Tomato sauce, up to the end of Step 3.
  2. When the meatballs come out of the oven, add them, along with all of their cooking juices, to the tomato sauce and simmer for 10 to 15 minutes.
  3. Finish step 4 of the tomato sauce (adding the fresh herbs and olive oil)
  4. Serve with crusty bread or with cooked pasta.

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Reviews on "Italian Meatballs" (10)

  1. October 14, 2022
    great taste, easy to put together, gonna be a go to for me
    • October 14, 2022
      awesome, so glad you love the recipes
    • November 16, 2022
      These are so delicious and moist. I used ground hot Italian sausage meat and ground grass fed grass finished beef. Will definitely make again and again!
      • November 18, 2022
        So glad you loved them!
  2. January 8, 2023
    Great hack using Italian sausages in place of where I'd normally use ground pork! So much flavour already built in. Making again tonight with hot Italian sausages this time. I may kick in a little extra seasoning and I like to sneak in some shredded onion (gotta keep it small so the kids don't notice ;-)
    • January 8, 2023
      yes, that's absolutely my favourite thing about this recipe as well! Glad you love it.
  3. April 25, 2023
    Awesome recipe! Definitely added to the repertoire 👍
    • April 26, 2023
      so glad you enjoyed it :)
  4. July 9, 2024
    Heidi, I just love watching you create meals on Cooking on the Coast. I wish there were more of them. Unfortunately, I missed this mornings episode but caught up with the recipe on this website. I will be making them for sure. Wondered if I can use plain sausage meat or ground pork instead of the Italian sausage meat?
    • July 9, 2024
      Thank you so much, Shelagh! You can use a different type of sausage meat for sure. Plain ground pork in this recipe will not have enough seasoning - but you can add seasoning and garlic to plain ground pork in this recipe and see how it goes

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