Top | Main Dishes

Baked Chicken Meatballs

(recipe, Katie Hickey)

Introduction

The original recipe calls for tomato paste, but we made it with leftover sun-dried tomato pesto, which I highly recommend. If you don't ahve any, at least stir some chopped pine nuts into the mix, as they made a big difference.

Ingredients

  1. 3 slices Italian bread, torn into small bits (1 cup)
  2. ⅓ cup milk
  3. 1 small onion, finely chopped
  4. 1 small garlic clove, minced
  5. 1 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil (if using tomato paste)
  6. 1 large egg
  7. 1 lb. ground chicken
  8. 2 Tbsp. tomato paste (or sun dried tomato pesto), divided
  9. 3 Tbsp. finely chopped flat-leaf parsley

Steps

  1. Preheat oven to 400°F with a rack in the upper third of the oven. Soak bread in milk in a small bowl until softened, about four minutes.
  2. Cook onion, and garlic in oil with ½ teaspoon each of salt and pepper in a large skillet over medium heat until onion is softened, about 6 minutes. Cool slightly.
  3. Squeeze bread to remove excess milk, then discard milk. Lightly beat egg in a large bowl, then combine with chicken, 1 tablespoon tomato paste (or sun dried tomato pesto), onion mixture, bread, and parsley. Form 12 meatballs and arrange in another 4-sided sheet pan lined with foil (or a 9×13 roasting dish).
  4. Stir together remaining tablespoons of tomato paste and oil and brush over meatballs (the paste/oil does not mix in any cohesive manner, but just smoosh it on and run with it. If you use pesto, you probably don't need the oil) , then bake in upper third of oven until meatballs are just cooked through, 15 to 20 minutes (though mine took a good 5 minutes longer).