Recipe Alert! Paleo Chicken Parm Meatballs

I love people with food. That is just who I am. It’s almost as if I was an Italian grandmother in another life and I left this Earth in the middle of cooking dinner and now I’m trying to fulfill my destiny of feeding everyone. From a Love Languages perspective, I am almost 100% Acts of Service. From an Enneagram perspective, I am a 2w3, which is commonly known as the hostess. It all tracks. I love to cook. I love to serve people. I love to serve people food that I’ve cooked.

With all of that said, Friday was Valentine’s Day and I always have something cooked up for my family on these special days (<—see what I did there?). This was no different. Usually I have something special for breakfast, although the kids weren’t interested. If I have learned anything during my tenure as mother, and it’s taken me a long time to learn this, but don’t do more than you have to. If the kids aren’t feeling your special breakfast, don’t bother, because you’ll only feel disappointed and unloved by their lackluster interest in your hard work. So, although I was mildly disappointed, I moved on.

If there isn’t a special breakfast, then I usually pack them some kind of themed lunch. Pb& J’s cut into hearts, strawberries, heart stickers, love notes, whatever I can come up with. I did that on Thursday, because Friday’s are famously Pizza Day at school. So, I was off the hook there, too.

So, what’s for dinner?! Always the question of the day. Obviously we weren’t going out anywhere. For one thing, I have no business in a restaurant on Valentine’s Day with my family of 5. That feels like more headache than reward. Also, I am not interested in a 45 minute wait for an overpriced Pre Fixe menu that I could have made at home, better, for 1/4 the price. No, I’m cooking these people I love something from the heart. I wracked my brain all day. I had so many ideas. Steaks with chimichurri, roast chicken, shrimp scampi, I could go on. But, when I polled the group it was an overwhelming consensus – Spaghetti with Meatballs!

Now, usually when I make spaghetti I make a Bolognese that I simmer for a few hours with wine and meats and love. It’s delicious. But these people wanted meatballs and sauce, so I knew just what to make – my own Paleo Chicken Parm Meatballs with Marinara. It comes together relatively quickly, tastes delicious, and is free of both dairy and gluten – 2 food sensitivities that we have in our family.

Before I get to the recipe, I’ll add a note here about kids and veggies. My kids don’t generally bat an eye at vegetables on their plate or in their food. I cook with a lot of vegetables – I tuck them into dishes, stir them into sauces, roast them, saute them, steam them, puree them, serve them raw. They enjoy them and I don’t often have to fight them to eat them. They just know they must and they often enjoy them. I fully realize this is not the case with so many kiddos. This recipe is packed FULL of veggies and your kids won’t be the wiser about a lot of them. I don’t often advocate lying to your kids, but when it comes to the anti-veggie clan – hide the veggies wherever you can until you move out of the phase where all green things = evil incarnate. Now, onto the recipe.

Paleo Chicken Parm Meatballs & Marinara
Prep Time: 20 Minutes
Cook Time: 30 Minutes
Yield: 15 Meatballs/5 servings

Sauce Ingredients
1 Large Carrot, Peeled
1 Large Celery Stalk
1/2 Large Onion
1/2 each Red & Green Bell Pepper
3 Cloves Garlic (I usually double my amount of garlic, but this is the standard amount for anyone who doesn't love it as much as me)
2 TB Tomato Paste
1 tsp. Oregano
1/2 tsp. Thyme
Salt & Pepper
1/2 Cup Wine (red or white works here, whatever you are drinking or have on hand. I used a Pinot Noir, but a Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio, Sauvignon Blanc, or Cab would work here too)
1 24 oz jar Passata (could sub tomato sauce or crushed tomato)
1 cup Broth or Water
Handful Chopped Basil
1/2 cup Nutpods (could sub coconut milk, almond milk, or milk)

Meatballs
1 lb Ground Chicken
Salt & Pepper
1/4 cup Almond Flour
1/4 cup Rice Flour (could sub almond flour)
1/2 cup grated dairy free Parmesan
2 Cloves Garlic, grated
2 tsp. Lemon Zest
Handful Chopped Parsley
1 tsp. Onion Powder
2 TB Nutpods (any milk)
2 TB EVOO
Handfull of Finely Chopped Spinach

1 lb Gluten Free Spaghetti or pasta of choice
1-2 Zucchini, spiralized

*There are plenty of substitutions you can use for this recipe. If you are fine with gluten, use 1/2 cup of regular breadcrumbs instead of the flours and regular pasta. If you are cool with dairy, use regular milk and parmesan. If you don't have broth, water will do just fine. If you want to keep this low carb, use only zoodles!

*Don't worry about serving this to your kids with wine in it. The alcohol will cook off and just impart the sauce with its complex flavors. It's worth it, trust me - plus, your sauce will feel so much fancier.


Preparations:

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Line a baking sheet with a silicon mat or a sheet of parchment paper. Bring a large pot of water to boil for the pasta.

2. Prep the sauce: cut the veggies for the sauce into large chunks and toss into a food processor or blender. Pulse the veggies until they are finely chopped. (If you want the veggies to be undetectable and the sauce to be smooth, puree the veggies). Heat a large saucepan over medium heat. When the pan is warm, add the EVOO, then add the chopped veggies. Season with salt and pepper. Allow veggies to cook, stirring occasionally, allowing them to soften but not brown, about 5-7 minutes. If you pureed the veggies, you only need to cook the puree for a minute.

3. While the veggies soften, prep the meatballs. In a medium bowl add ground chicken, season with salt and pepper, about 1 teaspoon of each. Add flours, milk, EVOO, grated garlic, lemon zest, onion powder, parsley, spinach, dairy free parm, and milk. Mix until ingredients are evenly distributed.

4. Back to the sauce – Add oregano, thyme and tomato paste and stir well, coating the veggies. Cook 1 minute, then stir in 1/2 cup of wine. Stir until the wine is absorbed, which takes just a few minutes. Add the passata and broth, stirring to combine. Allow to simmer on low for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.

5. While sauce simmers, roll chicken into 1.5 inch balls and place on prepared baking sheet. You could use a small ice cream scoop or the tablespoon you used to measure for this recipe to ensure consistent size and shape. Roast the meatballs until light golden brown, about 15-20 minutes.

6. Salt the boiling water and add the pasta. Stir the pasta and cook until 1-2 minutes less than the package instructions. Gluten free pasta is gummy when overcooked and is best when slightly undercooked. This would also be the time to spiralize your zucchini, if you didn’t buy it pre-spiraled. Once it is spiralized, place it in your colander and lightly salt it. This will draw some of the water out and make it soft – likely the same consistency as your al dente noodles, there is no need to cook it. When you drain your noodles, if you using a chickpea pasta, lentil pasta, or something similar, give the pasta a little rinse to wash away the pasta water.

7. Chop or tear the basil, adding it to the sauce. Turn off the heat and stir in the Nutpods/milk. Taste for salt and pepper. At this stage, you can let your freak flag fly – if you want to add the meatballs to the sauce, you can. If you want to put the noodles, meatballs, and sauce all together into one pot, you can do that too! I like to layer my ingredients, tossing my noodles/zoodles together with a little olive oil or dairy free butter, adding a layer of sauce, and topping with my meatballs. But you do you!