Asian Turkey Meatballs

We ate pasta twice in the pasta two days, and we have had chicken all week. I was looking at our second package of chicken in our fridge, uninspired and not in the mood to do a big batch of chicken only to be in the same predicament I was currently in just a half an hour later.

To make things slightly more challenging for tonight's dinner, our produce choices were pretty limited too; our daughter is a human garbage disposal when it comes to fruit. It was Asian turkey meatballs to the rescue!

Asian turkey meatballs cook up quickly

Luckily, I did have a few staples in our fridge that make things so much easier. Specifically, these wonderfully flavorful and not your average pantry items.

We also still had a big ol' bag of chicken cilantro wontons taking up way too much space in our freezer.

Suddenly, dinner was coming together pretty easily while my wife had our youngest down for a nap.

Tonight I made wonton soup, white rice, and these wonderfully simple Asian Turkey Meatballs.

Add on some soup with mini wontons

The soup itself can't get any easier. In a bit pot, I added 2 cartons of FF, low sodium chicken broth (0sp), 3 crushed cloves of garlic, and 4 whole green onions (I chose the slightly limper ones of the bunch since I planned on slicing the rest for garnish since I'm fancy and all).

The real kicker for the broth was a little bit of fresh ginger that fell out of our freezer when I was scrounging for something to make.

Did you know you can just throw fresh ginger in the freezer unwrapped and it lasts forever? Not actually forever, but still good. I put a small piece (roughly the same size and shape as a piece of Orbit gum) into the pot with the other ingredients.

I brought the broth to a boil, reduced to simmer, and left that going until everything else was ready. Before adding the wontons, I tasted the broth and added a small pinch of salt. It was so flavorful with barely any additional ingredients!

Once the meatballs were out of the oven and my daughter was waking up from her nap, I dropped the frozen wontons into the broth and put the heat on medium until they were finished (they're fully cooked so just needed about 2-3 minutes).

9 wontons are just 3sp and the broth is still zero! I added some chopped scallions before serving, mostly since I've never had wonton soup without a few floating in there.

Making the meatballs

Onto the meatballs. They are amazingly flavorful and still somehow only 4 points for 4, turkey meatballs. If you use the 99% FF turkey, it is only 1 point for 4! Wegmans' family pack comes in 94% only, so that's what I am working with here.

These Asian turkey meatballs are great on their own, not dry at all, but I love dipping sauces. The Wegmans Sesame Garlic sauce is great and adds an extra level of depth to these just barely spicy meatballs.

Topped with a few sesame seeds and scallions, these were a huge hit! Don't be afraid of the garlic chili paste. I know it seems spicy. It smells spicy and it's got the Sriracha chicken on it, but trust me it adds such a faint spice, but a ton of flavor. Our 9-month-old loved these as did our 3-year-old.

We paired these with rice, but we have been known to decide on Chinese and pick up steamed white rice on the way home from work. It's usually like $2 and well worth the convenience. Since we didn't think ahead, I made the last of our basmati rice and I'll be scrubbing that pot for the rest of the night.

Print Recipe

Asian Turkey Meatballs

Prep Time5 mins

Cook Time20 mins

Total Time25 mins

Course: dinner

Cuisine: Chinese

Servings: 6

Author: Ed

Ingredients

• 1 ½ pound s 94% fat-free ground turkey breast
• ⅔ cup s panko breadcrumbs
• 1 item s egg(s)
• 2 Tbsp minced garlic
• 1 Tbsp low sodium soy sauce
• 1 Tbsp garlic chili paste
• 1 Tbsp cilantro

Instructions

• Combine all ingredients until uniformly mixed. If you like it a little spicier, feel free to add a little more chili paste.
• Divide into 6 portions. Mine come out to an even 30oz which was pure luck in my opinion since it is simple math, so I made 5oz portions.
• I divide each 5oz portion into 4, smaller than a golf ball meatballs. The meat mixture is definitely sticky, but that’s okay. Dividing into portions before rolling them into meatballs helped take the guesswork out of exactly how many I would get. Once they were all rolled, they went onto a baking sheet sprayed with PAM and went into the oven for 15-20 minutes. 
• Bake until your meatballs are cooked through with an internal temperature of 165 degrees F.

We hope you like it!

Try our popular chicken and broccoli recipe for another Chinese food takeout makeover to serve alongside the Asian turkey meatballs.

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