Super easy meatball dinner recipes

We don't do much beef in this house, since my son is allergic to it.  Most of our meatballs are made with ground turkey or ground chicken.  We keep a bunch of them frozen for an easy meal when we are pressed for time. My son especially will eat meatballs anytime, any way.  So we make them often.  We don't have a regular recipe that we follow for them, we usually just toss in whatever we feel like, and my son is usually the one who makes them when we do make them.  Our normal ingredients are garlic, onion powder, breadcrumbs, an egg, a little salt and pepper, sometimes worcestershire sauce, parsley, celery salt.  (We also keep bags of pre-made frozen turkey meatballs around for when we are really pressed for time at dinner.) 


Today I was searching the freezer for meal ideas and decided on meatballs, so I figured I'd make a sweet and sour meatball.  Our usual recipe is grape jelly and bbq sauce in the crockpot with our meatballs and cook them for 4-6 hours.  The ratio is 1:1 for jelly and sauce, and its very easy and really delicious.  But today we had no grape jelly and no bbq sauce, other than the 'squealin' pig' kind that is way too spicy for my liking.  So I searched around the fridge, looked online and came up with a few other ideas for meatball meals.  I jotted down the recipes I came up with and then decided on one. 

1 cup currant jelly 1/8 tsp allspice 20 meatballs.  Toss the meatballs in the sauce.  Simmer on the stove until thickened.  5 minutes or so.  Serve with rice or potatoes.

1 tbsp cider vinegar 1/8 tsp celery seed toss with 2 cups shredded cabbage, 2 sliced scallions, 2 tbsp mayo and salt and pepper. Toss meatballs in 2/3 cup of a spicy bbq sauce and top with the cabbage mixture.  Put on mini buns. 

Cut 10 meatballs in half, get a premade pizza dough or make your own.  top with 1/2 cup pesto, 1 cup ricotta, 1/2 cup slices roasted peppers and meatballs, season with salt and pepper.  Bake at 475* for 15-18 min.

Cook 20 meatballs with marinara sauce and cover with mozzarella and fontina cheese.  Bake at 400* until the cheese has melted, 15-20 min.  Serve with garlic bread. 

Place 1 cup of couscous in a bowl with 1/2 cup of sliced, dried apricots.  Add 1 cup of boiling water and cover for 5 min.  Fluff and fold in 2 chopped scallions, 2 tbsp olive oil, season with salt and pepper.  Put meatballs on top and drizzle with 1/2 cup plain greek yogurt. 

These all sound really good, and I'll definitely be trying them all, but my original idea of sweet and sour meatballs was still on my mind.  So I put my meatballs in the crockpot with 2 tbsp agave syrup, 1 tbsp worcestershire sauce, 1 tbsp chopped garlic, and 1/2 cup bourbon sauce (I use the Tastefully Simple Bayou Bourbon). Mmm Mmm, good!!!