Healthy turkey meatballs

by Sara Buenfeld

Swap beef mince and breadcrumbs with lean turkey and oats. Serve in a tomato sauce with pasta or potatoes for a light dinner.

Ingredients

For the sauce

• 1 tbsp rapeseed oil
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 2 carrots, finely diced
• 2 celery sticks, finely diced
• 2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
• 1 fennel bulb, halved and thinly sliced, fronds reserved
• 500g carton tomato passata
• 500ml reduced-salt chicken stock
• 2 tbsp chopped parsley
• broccoli and potatoes or pasta and salad, to serve

For the meatballs

• 400g pack lean turkey breast mince
• 4 tbsp porridge oat
• 1 tsp fennel seed, crushed
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• spray of oil
  
  

How to make it

STEP 1

Heat the oil in a large non-stick frying pan with a lid, then tip in the onion, carrots, celery, garlic and fennel, and stir well. Cover the pan and cook over a medium heat for 8 mins, stirring every now and then. Pour in the passata and stock, cover and leave to simmer for 20 mins.

STEP 2

Meanwhile, tip the mince into a large bowl. Add the oats, fennel seeds and leaves, the garlic and plenty of black pepper, and mix in with your hands. Lightly shape into 25 meatballs about the size of a walnut. Spray or rub a non-stick pan with a little oil and gently cook the meatballs until they take on a little colour. Give the sauce a stir, then add the meatballs and parsley. Cover and cook for 10 mins until they are cooked through and the veg in the sauce is tender. Serve with broccoli and baby potatoes in their skins, or pasta and salad.

Recipe courtesy of BBC Food