Turkey meatball stew
The perfect midweek meal
Eagle-eyed readers (yes, all three of you) will note that this is the second turkey meatball recipe to appear on this blog in less than a month.
"What's with the turkey meatballs?", I hear you cry. Well, I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm basically a convert... and one who's happy to evangelise. As I said before, turkey is healthy, reasonably priced... and it's delicious.
This recipe uses fennel, which is another ingredient I don't use half as much as I could. You can make your own turkey meatballs if you can be faffed (lots of recipes online). Or you can buy 'em ready made in the supermarket, like Lazy Lucy here.
We had our stew with cheesy mashed potato, but it also works well with pasta or broccoli, if you want to ditch the carbs.
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 onion, finely chopped
- 2 carrots, finely diced
- 2 sticks of celery
- 2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
- 1 fennel bulb, halved and sliced (without the fronds)
- 1 tin of chopped tomatoes
- 4 medium-sized fresh tomatoes, well chopped
- 400ml chicken stock
- 1 teaspoon smoked paprika (add more or less according to personal preference)
To serve:
- A generous handful of fresh parsley, chopped (optional)
Method
- Add the olive oil to a large, deep frying pan or wok.
- Add in the onion, carrots, celery, garlic and fennel and cook on a low heat for around ten minutes until soft.
- While the veg is cooking, cook the turkey meatballs in a separate pan for around 10-15 minutes until it's cooked through.
- Add the tinned and fresh chopped tomatoes, the chicken stock and the smoked paprika to the vegetables. Set to simmer.
- Once the turkey meatballs are cooked, add them into the pan with the vegetables.
- Leave the stew to cook for around 20 minutes and get on with preparing your accompaniment - pasta, potatoes, broccoli or other.
- Ensure the turkey is fully cooked though before serving.
- Sprinkle the parsley on top to serve - the colour will contrast nicely with the red sauce and add some extra flavour.
NB This recipe makes enough for 4 people, but if you save it to your MyMeals365 app, you can change the number of servings and the app will work out the exact quantities of each ingredient you need.