One of my father’s favorite recipes was this lima bean soup, a mainstay of Depression-era cuisine when fresh meat was in short supply and soup stretched everything. With lots of ham bits, it is cooked until thick. This filling soup appeals to even lima bean haters!
| Prep Time: | 15 mins |
| Cook Time: | 40 mins |
| Total Time: | 55 mins |
| Servings: | 5 |
| Yield: | 5 servings |
Ingredients
- 4 eggs
- 1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
- ½ cup cottage cheese
- ½ cup finely chopped onion
- 1 cup finely chopped pecans
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- 1 ½ teaspoons salt
- ¼ teaspoon dried sage
- 2 cups Italian seasoned bread crumbs
- ¼ cup vegetable oil
- ¼ cup white vinegar
- ¾ cup apricot jam
- 1 cup ketchup
- ¼ cup minced onion
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1 dash hot pepper sauce
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
- In a large bowl, mix together the eggs, Cheddar cheese, and cottage cheese until well blended. Mix in 1/2 cup onion, pecans, basil, salt and sage. Stir in bread crumbs. Form the mixture into 2 inch balls, and place them in a 9×13 inch baking dish.
- In another bowl, whisk together the vegetable oil, vinegar, apricot jam, ketchup, 1/4 cup onion, oregano and hot pepper sauce. Pour over meatballs.
- Bake uncovered for 35 to 40 minutes in the preheated oven, until meatballs are firm, and sauce is thick and bubbly.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 803 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 82 g |
| Cholesterol | 181 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 5 g |
| Protein | 25 g |
| Saturated Fat | 11 g |
| Sodium | 2264 mg |
| Sugars | 36 g |
| Fat | 45 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
I’m always looking for vegetarian meals to surprise my daughter when she comes to visit. These are her absolute favorite meatballs. They are also a favorite of those in my family who eat meat. The only thing I do differently is with the sauce. I use half the ketchup that the recipe calls for.
The meatball texture was very good. Watching salt intake so I substituted 1/2 cup seasoned breadcrumbs for non-seasoned, and reduced salt to just 1 tsp. Used vegan mozzarella instead of cheddar and still tasted good. Didn’t have apricot jam so I just replaced sauce with spaghetti sauce. My guess is you can use whatever sauce you want.
excellent meatballs alone or on spaghetti.
I followed the suggestions and omitted the sage, and added 1tsp of italian herbs and1 tsp garlic powder. For the sauce I omitted oil and used onion powder instead of onion. Turned out great! Definitely do not miss the meat, and has a real meatball texture. Want to try with parmesan instead of cheddar and serve with spaghetti or as a meatball sandwich.
I’m not a big fan of vegetarian meals, but this tasted great. The sauce is wonderful. I put my meatballs on a bed of rice which went very well with this meal. I highly recommend this recipe, and it’s not too hard to make with a food processor.
my granddaughter is vegetarian and I make this for her to replace the meat others are having. I do bake the meatballs b4 topping them with the sauce. I increased the sauce to cover the meatballs. she loves this dish
These were a hit, will definately make again! I added garlic and 1/2-3/4 cup less bread crumbs and still firmed up surprisingly; I thought it was gonna turn into mush, but didn’t. I would add more hot sauce as it was pretty sweet with out much sour but great base recipe. Also I was short on cheese but don’t think it affected them.
I had a veggie meatball recipe a few years ago that was just okay; I tried this version as an offering for my daughter, who has recently gone vegetarian. As another reviewer suggested, I used half the amount of bread crumbs and I used panko instead of regular; I also used Italian seasoning, because it was all I had. The mixture was pretty mushy and a little tricky to form, but it firmed up nicely in the oven, and the finished product tasted as close to real ground beef as any vegetarian version I have ever eaten. Overall, I was very pleased and I will make this recipe again!
Sweet and tangy! I served it with rice noodles. They cut the vinegar a bit. Even non-vegetarians should like this dish. I didn’t have apricot preserves. I substituted a combination of orange and strawberry. Hmmm. I’ll make again with apricot. That will probably be even better.
These were very easy to make. Followed recipe exactly and they turned out perfect and tasted WAY better than I thought they would! Will make again for sure and might try another sweet n sour sauce or even a creamy mushroom sauce now that I have a basic, great-tasting “fakeball.” Lol
I made the sauce to go with meatballs I made with a 50/50 combination of hot sausage and ground beef. My son and friends raved about the sauce – it was easy, and I’ll do it again!
I made these as a side dish to our Christmas dinner. I followed the directions exactly as written. I put the pecans in a mini food processor and chopped them very, very fine. I have to say, for someone who is not a vegetarian, they were delicious! My two sons who are vegetarians loved them. Will definitely make this again.
My wife doesn’t like onions, so I substituted onion powder; roughly 2 teaspoons; turned out great. I would definitely recommend small curd cottage cheese, or you need to blend them up a bit. I also used 3/4 c eggbeaters substitute instead of regular eggs to cut down on the cholesterol. For a few of them, I fried them in a cast iron skillet to brown the sides, the put a homemade tomato sauce on them, covered it with tinfoil and put it in the oven at 350 for about 15 minutes. I then made them into a meatball sub with mozzarella and broiled to melt the cheese. It was amazing. My wife doesn’t really like meatball subs, but she really like it.
I didn’t have any sage so just added a bit more of the Italian spice instead. I wasn’t sure about this combination but it worked out great. I made the sauce and baked it separately from the balls because I wanted to serve them on buns and didn’t know if the sauce would be too sweet. It wasn’t so the next time I am going to double the batch and save half for ‘snacking’ on. My husband who is a true meat and potatoe man told me that this recipe is a keeper!
Good recipe but we adapted to fit our taste. I left out the sage because I just personally don’t like sage. We actually forgot the pecans and they still turned out hearty! They sweet & sour was really sour! I think it was the preserves I bought; fixed that with 1/4 c. Splenda.
Wow! Hands down the most convincing meat free dish I have had. My husband and 9 year old were convinced it was made with burger. I would have thought so too if I hadn’t made it. Bravo! I will try this “meat” for spaghetti meatballs and a meat loaf.
These are incredible. Make them.
I have to try making them again. I didn’t make the sauce, we have our favorite Sweet & Sour Sauce by Contadina. They were terribly dry. I also used minced onion (dry) and think that dried them out. I’m sure they will be great once I cook them correctly. I will rate them again after I try them again.
My family loved these, I will make these over and over again even for meat eaters.
This is the first review I have ever made anywhere a little messy to make the vegetarian balls but worth it perhaps a little more breadcrumbs would have helped .Sauce was great and cooked them on my grill make sure you coat them with vegetable oil and turn them for a really crispy outside . I then put them in a crock pot and added the sauce. They were a bit with the wife ??
Wow. As a #1 meat lover, I was SHOCKED how good these are! They are DELICIOUS! I had a vegetarian friend over for dinner and gave these a whirl. Followed the meatball recipe as written except: ( used 1 c. Egg whites, made my own sprout bread bread crumbs and used my own seasonings). My friend also LOVED these and took the recipe home. The texture and firmness were perfect after baking (I was nervous because the raw state seemed a little soupy), you could not tell it was a “meatless” meatball. I’m already thinking about all of the other sauces/meatballs you could make with this recipe – curry..teriyaki.. mushroom gravy..and on and on. Whoever came up with this recipe is brilliant!