Really Easy Meat and Cheese Balls

Do you make your own meatballs for your recipes or do you buy them pre-made? I have a very easy recipe for homemade meatballs I got from my Mom. They're so easy that you can add them to spaghetti, soups, swedish recipes, sweet & sour meatball recipes (see Menus 4 Moms), and others galore! They're easy to freeze. Yay, meatballs!

Way Too Easy Meatballs

1 pound of lean ground beef

1/4 cup or 1/3 cup of bread crumbs*

salt & pepper

other spices you may like

egg (optional)

Mix well all the ingredients together in a bowl and form the meat into balls. If you're making soup, drop raw meatballs into the boiling soup or spaghetti to cook thoroughly, about 10 to 15 minutes. If you're adding meatballs that need to be thoroughly cooked before going into the dish (sweet & sour for example) then you can place them on a microwave bacon tray and nuke them for 5-6 minutes depending on how large your meatballs are. That's what makes them super easy and you drain excess fat while cooking on the bacon tray!

*You can make your own homemade breadcrumbs by toasting bread and grinding in a food processor. It makes a lot of crumbs, it's easier to count the calories too and you can season your breadcrumbs any way you like.

Jeramy likes the singed taste of the skillet instead of the microwave, which seals in flavor better, but the meatballs lose their shape as you try to turn them to cook thoroughly.

What about cheese balls? My Mom makes a really awesome Chicken Cheese Ball. I've misplaced my recipe card, but it essentially goes like this:

Chicken Cheese Ball

8 oz Cream Cheese

10 - 13 oz can of white meat chicken*

dash of Worcestershire sauce

paprika, garlic powder, onion powder, salt & pepper to taste preferrence

crushed nuts or wheat germ

Combine all the ingredients except the nuts or germ and mix very well by hand or in a food processor. Form into a ball and roll or press nuts onto the outside. Ta da! Serve with crackers or it's also great as a sandwich spread. Click here for a picture.

*If you already have cooked chicken left over, use 8 oz packed of shredded chicken.

Last Sunday at church I prepared a cheese ball using only a flavored cream cheese and crushed nuts and it was a hit. Yeah, that was easy!