These meatballs are pretty terrific as a munchie and as amain course – served over yellow rice with Cherry Chipotle Barbecue Sauce, and freshly chopped parsley sprinkled over the top.
“Oh!” you say “I can’t eat meatballs, because I can’t eat anything with flour.”
Well, welcome back to meatballs, because, instead of bread crumbs, I used seasoned, ground oatmeal, and it all turned out very, very well.
Now, there is a bit of effort and planning involved. You have to prepare and bake the meatballs in the oven, then finish ’em off in the slow cooker.
Thing is; you can make the barbecue sauce in a slow cooker while you’re baking the meatballs; and then toss ’em all in the slow cooker for a couple of hours before dinner.
Or…
You could bake the meatballs a day or two ahead and freeze and stash in the freezer to have ’em on hand for an easy meal or munchie.
INGREDIENTS
•1/2 cup Seasoned Oatmeal Crumbs
•1/4 cup milk
•1 lb extra-lean ground beef
•1 lb ground pork
•1 egg, lightly beaten
•4 green onions, sliced (white and light green parts only)
•1/2 tsp Seasoned Salt
•One batch Cherry Chipotle Barbecue Sauce
Stir the milk into the oatmeal crumbs in a large mixing bowl and set aside to rest for five minutes.
Add the ground meats, the egg, the green onion, and seasoned salt and combine well.
Line two rimmed baking pans with heavy duty foil and apply cooking spray.
Scoop the meat mixture into one inch meatballs (I got 62) and arrange on the prepared baking pans.
Place the racks on two shelves in a hot 375º oven and cook for ten minutes.
Flip the pans and cook for another ten minutes, until your instant read thermometer measures 160º.
Remove from the oven and transfer to a large slow cooker.
Pour the prepared Cherry Chipotle Barbecue Sauce over the meatballs, then cover and cook on high for two hours, or on low for four hours.
Dinner (or munchie) done!
And wicked tasty!
By the way, you can also save the chopped dark green bits of the scallions and sprinkle ’em over the top of the finished meatballs along with the parsley.