A couple weeks ago a friend gave me a recipe for zucchini meatballs. After some tweaking, I’ve come up with something Matt loved so much that he ate 20 golf-ball sized meatballs in one day. No joke. When Matt, the chef, thinks something is that good…I go for it! This weekend, I’m making a double batch and hopeful to freeze some for winter.

You can play around with this a bit. If you don’t have a sweet potato, add a couple carrots instead. In place of the beef or turkey, use pork or chicken. I may even use lamb sometime and add some garam masala and curry.

We shaped these like large meatballs, but you could definitely make them smaller or even make sliders or burgers out of them. After cooked, they will freeze like charm. Plus, added bonus…there are more vegetables than meat in this recipe and you would never know it!

Zucchini Meatballs
* makes 26-30 golf ball size meatballs

Ingredients:

• olive oil
• Kosher salt & pepper
• 2lb zucchini and/or summer squash
• 1 sweet potato or 2 carrots
• 1 large or 2 medium yellow onions
• 4 garlic cloves
• 6 sprigs each thyme & oregano, stems removed
• 4 sprigs parsley, large stems removed
• 12oz jar roasted red peppers, drained
• 2lb ground meat, I used 1lb beef and 1lb turkey
• 8oz Panko bread crumbs
• 2 eggs

Directions:

1. Heat a large sauce pan or stock pot over medium heat.
2. Using the fine grater on your food processor, grate the zucchini, sweet potato, onions, and garlic.
3. Add a glug of olive oil to the pan and swirl to coat. Add grated items to pan and allow to cook, stirring often until cooked, about 8-10 minutes. Season with salt & pepper.
4. While those are cooking, switch to the blade of your food processor and pulse the parsley and roasted red peppers until very finely chopped. Set aside.
5. About 1 minute before removing zucchini mixture from heat, stir in thyme & oregano.
6. Pour zucchini mixture into a large bowl and allow to cool for about 5-10 minutes.
7. Once cooled, stir in roasted red pepper mixture, ground meat, Panko, and eggs. Mix together.
8. Heat a small pan, add a little olive oil, and cook a small portion of the mixture to make sure seasoning is on point. Adjust if needed.
9. Form the mixture into whatever sizes you like…large meatballs, small meatballs, sliders, etc. Cook these as you need them over the next couple days or cook them all and freeze some for later. We pan fried ours and then tossed them in roasted tomato sauce for the most delightful meatball subs you’ve ever had! (Updated note…we have found that for reheating from frozen…thaw overnight in fridge, place on a sheet pan in a 375 degree oven, and heat to desired doneness. We have enjoyed brushing two or three times during heating with a glaze of some sort…whether a ketchup based sauce, Korean BBQ, etc.)