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Sweet and Sour Meatballs

My mom used to make sweet and sour meatballs for a weeknight supper and I always loved the pineapple and green pepper chunks in it. When I got married I soon realized that green peppers were not a favourite in this dish so I now omit them but we all still enjoy the pineapple. If your family don't care for pineapple or you just don't have any in your pantry they can be left out of the recipe and you'll still have a tasty sweet and sour meatball dish. I like to serve this over brown rice.

  • 1 pound lean ground beef
  • 1/4 cup fine bread crumbs
  • 1/4 cup grated onion
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1 egg
  • 1 398ml can pineapple chunks, save the juice for the sauce.
  • 1 1/2 cups liquid, fill measuring cup with pineapple juice and add water to make the 1 1/2 cups. If you are not using pineapple in the recipe just use water for the 1 1/2 cups of liquid.
  • 1/2 cup ketchup
  • 1/2 cup vinegar
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 3 tbsp soy sauce
  • 1/2 tsp dry mustard
  • 3 tbsp flour
  1. Mix together ground beef, bread crumbs, onion, salt and egg.
  2. Form into golf ball size meatballs and place on parchment lined baking sheet. 
  3. Bake in 375º oven for 15 minutes.
  4. While meat balls are baking combine remaining ingredients except for the pineapple chunks.
  5. Whisk together until smooth and combined. 
  6. When meatballs are done place in a casserole dish and add pineapple chunks.
  7. Pour liquid mixture over and bake in 350º for 40 minutes. Serve over cooked rice.

18 comments:

  1. Sounds fantastic. I have some ground Bison that would work really well here. I've also made a similar recipe using pork riblets. I think it's in the Better Homes and Gardens 1960ish red plaid cookbook. Good recipes keep coming back.

    Sharon

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  2. Oh yes, I am sure that this recipe is circa 1975! I remember it well! Mom often used this recipe with what she called "spare ribs". Nowadays, I would only make baby back ribs on the bbq, but meatballs like this is a real weekday, comfort meal.

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  3. Oh Yum! This is a dish that I haven't made for far too long - we like the green peppers in this but I also like to use red peppers. Love your meat ball recipe Kathy!

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  4. What is a 398 can size for the pinepple?

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    Replies
    1. 398ml size or in ounces it would be a 12-14oz can. I hope that helps you.

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  5. Wow…it sounds so good, baked sweet and sour meatball. At first I thought it is a stir fry dish. It is quite special. Probably some onion in meatball will be really nice and I think bell pepper in sweet and sour dish should be quite nice too, maybe I will still add it. But definitely, pineapple is really delicious in this. :)

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  6. We had this for dinner tonight....with green peppers. :-) Everyone raved about it. I added some halved red grape tomatoes I had on hand to use them up and add a little more color to the dish. Rosella's idea of adding a red pepper will be great when we no longer have so many tomatoes. Thank you so much Kathy, for sharing this recipe. We all loved it!

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  7. I wasn't expecting it to have dry mustard.....I don't have any and I know you can substitute it for reg mustard, but what if I just omit it?

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    Replies
    1. You could use regular mustard or just omit. Enjoy!

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    2. Dijon or grainy mustard would both go really well in the recipe too!

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  8. I'm planning on making triple the recipe. I'm making the meatballs in advance for Christmas Eve and then planning on heating them up in the slowcooker with the sauce for a couple of hours. Do you think I need to add as much flour to the sauce? I assume it's a thickener.

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  9. You could cut down on the flour. It will just be a thinner sauce. Merry Christmas. Enjoy!

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  10. This turned out soooo good! Pure comfort. The only change I made was to substitute brown sugar with some coconut sugar I bought but hadn't tried yet - who has coconut sugar but not brown sugar?? lol! Thanks for sharing this true winner with us.

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    Replies
    1. Hi Lynette, so glad to hear that you all enjoyed this recipe. Coconut sugar....that would taste good, but I never have it in the pantry. Always fun hearing about the exchanges others make to a recipe. Thanks!

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  11. Hi - thanks so much for posting this! I have a quick question (and I know it's a silly one but I'm a fairly new cook). When you bake this in the casserole dish for 40 minutes, is that covered or uncovered? Thanks again!!

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    Replies
    1. Hi Catharine. No question is silly...I still ask questions. I bet you are getting to be a wonderful cook. I bake them uncovered. You can always check them half way through and if you find they are getting to done or really bubbly cover with tin foil or a lid. Sometimes when I do a casserole cover for the first half and then uncover for the remainder of the baking. Other times I bake uncovered and realize it's getting too dark or done...so I cover. All the best. Kathy

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  12. I absolutely love this recipie. I even use the meatballs without the sweet and spur sauce for spaghetti.. they are amazing.

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    Replies
    1. So glad you like this recipe. It's nice to find recipes we can adapt and have as go to's.

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