Both Julie and I have been dabbling in the Paleo world...if you don't know what that is it's worth your time to do a little research on it. I did a 5 week paleo challenge through my CrossFit gym in March and Julie is in the middle of a 21 day Paleo/Primal experiment. All this paleo stuff has caused us to get creative with some of our recipes and find new paleo approved meals. Last week we came across a buffalo chicken meatball recipe that we decided we'd give a try and see how it was. Before I get into that I'll give you a quick explanation of Paleo.
To eat Paleo means to stick to a diet high in protein (chicken, eggs, beef, fish etc) and vegetables along with some fruits, nuts and seeds. A strict paleo diet eliminates all grains, beans, legumes, and dairy along with anything processed and with added sugar. It's pretty basic but with the way our culture eats can be difficult to stick to. Carbs and refined grains are a HUGE part of the American diet, they're cheap and easy. A primal diet allows for some dairy every now and then.
Enough of the education... if you're interested in learning more about those ways of eating check out Robb Wolf's site or Mark's site. Robb's will give more info on Paleo while Mark is more into Primal.
We decided to combine two different recipes for these meat balls to come up with a primal buffalo chicken meatball. It went a little something like this...
Buffalo Chicken Meatballs
Ingredients
- 1lb ground chicken
- 1 oz crumbled blue cheese
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup almond flour
- 1/2 cup hot sauce (Frank's)
- 2 stalks of celery, diced
- 4 green onions, sliced thin
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- ¼ teaspoon celery salt
- salt and pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees
- Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil and coat with non-stick spary
- Combine all the ingredients in a bowl and mix well
- Form meatballs to the desired size and place on baking sheet evenly spaced
- Bake for 20-30 min or until cooked through. Cooking time will depend on the size of your meatballs.
- Serve with extra sauce and celery sticks
- Enjoy!
We realized we had all the necessary ingredients on hand with the exception of ground chicken so we made our own using boneless/skinless chicken breasts. We just chunked up the chicken and then processed in a food processor till we got the consistency of ground chicken. Although it was a good idea it left our meatballs a little on the dry side, some fat is definitely necessary! We'll have to play with that the next time we make them. You can buy ground chicken at the store, that might work better and is faster if you don't want to make your own!
Overall these were pretty dang good besides being a little dry. They combined all the best things about buffalo chicken wings into one tasty bite with a little healthier twist. Hope you enjoy them as much as we did!
Melissa
