This was an experiment of mine that actually turned out well. I cooked everything in the tmx and steaming attachment.
I was able to cook the angel hair pasta in the basket whilst cooking the sauce below in the bowl. It worked but I’m not sure if it was a fluke. For this recipe I’m going to advise you to cook it on the stove whilst everything else is bubbling away. If you are feeling adventurous give it a whirl in the basket. I recommend only cooking the pasta in the basket if doing the bake version where it has extra time cooking away under the grill/oven. Be sure to use angel hair pasta though otherwise it wont cook through.
The below recipe is for the pasta bake version. You of course can just serve it as a standard pasta and meatball dish.
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Chicken Meatball Bake
- Total Time: 45
Description
An easy midweek meal that can be served two ways.
Ingredients
Scale
Meatballs
- 1/2 onion, peeled
- 1 garlic clove, peeled
- 1/2 medium carrot, roughly chopped
- 1/2 medium zucchini, roughly chopped
- 10 baby spinach leaves
- A pinch of parsley
- 1 tablespoon vegetable stock concentrate
- 400g chicken breast, chopped into large pieces
Sauce
- 1 large onion, peeled and quartered
- 3 cloves of garlic, peeled
- 1 carrot, roughly chopped
- 1 zucchini, roughly chopped
- 10 baby spinach leaves
- 1/2 capsicum, roughly chopped
- 10 fresh basil leaves
- 6 springs of fresh parsley
- 400g diced tomatoes
- 100g of water
- 1 tablespoon stock paste
- 300g angel hair pasta
- Grated Cheese
Instructions
Meatball prep
- Place vegetables and herbs into bowl.
- Blitz on speed 7 for 5-10 secs depending on how fine you want your vegetables.
- Add a heaped tablespoon of vegetable stock concentrate and chicken breasts.
- Blitz on speed 5 for approximately 6-10 seconds until you get a nice minced mixture. It may be slightly wet but that’s ok.
- Get a piece of scrunched up baking paper and run under water. Smooth out and place on the top steaming tray (you can steam veggies on the bottom tray if you like at the same time to bulk out the meal).
- Roll chicken mix into balls and place on the tray.
Sauce prep
- No need to rinse the bowl out. Any leftover chicken mix will add extra flavour.
- Place herbs and veggies except tomatoes into bowl. Blitz on speed 7 for 10 seconds. Scrape down.
- Add remaining ingredients.
- Put steaming attachment in place. Cook meatballs and sauce at Varoma/steaming temperature. speed 3 for 18 minutes.
- Meanwhile cook pasta on the stove (or in the steaming basket in place whilst the sauce and meatballs are cooking away. Just give the pasta a good rinse first to ensure its completely wet for even steaming).
- Once done, place drained pasta in an oven proof dish, top with meatballs and sauce. Sprinkle cheese over to the top. Place under a hot grill or into a hot oven to brown the cheese and create a firm cheesy crust.
- Serve with salad and garlic bread.
Notes
- Serve these as a standard pasta, meatball and sauce dish without baking if preferred.
- Prep Time: 15
- Cook Time: 30
Making this right now & it smells amazing. My daughter is drooling waiting for dinner.
Made this the other day and I must say how simple and yum it was. Miss14 loved it and had the leftovers for lunch the next day. DH added a couple cold with some pasta to his salad for work the next day. We got five serves from this, probably because we have Michelle Bridges size serves. Also served with a big salad. Happy it is so healthy as well. Will become a regular in our house.
Just wondering how many meatballs this should make?
About 20-24 depending on size.
ok so I did not have any chicken so I have used mince meat instead. it looks good we are having this for dinner tonight so im hoping it taste as good as it looks . Thank you peta
Absolutely delicious. I steamed zucchini, carrot and cauliflower in the varoma and didn’t bat an eyelide when my daughter pushed the zucchini aside while proclaiming ‘I don’t like zucchini”. She loved the meatballs and the sauce so she was eating zucchini quite happily in this meal- just that she didn’t know it 🙂
I have made this and it did taste nice. I think I slightly over cooked the meatballs though. I do intend to try this again!