Some of my co-workers follow this blog, so you all should probably be aware that I’m about to give away some trade secrets. This is one of my favorite recipes to bring to work potlucks, because it’s fairly easy to make ahead and works great in a crock pot. If I’m making it for dinner at home, I prefer to do it on the stovetop, but if I’m making it for work I’ll just dump the cooked meatballs and the sauce ingredients into a crock pot, stir it around, and cook it on low for a few hours once I get to work. They’re good to go by lunchtime and I hardly ever have any left over.
To make 20 meatballs, start with a pound and a half of ground beef in a large mixing bowl. To that, add 1 beaten egg, 1/3 cup of grated parmesan cheese, a tablespoon of smoked paprika, two teaspoons of oregano, a teaspoon and a half of salt, a teaspoon each of garlic powder and onion powder, and several grinds of black pepper. Mix all that together, then use a small cookie scoop to dole out 20 equal servings onto a cookie sheet lined with foil.
Use your hands to form the meatballs, then bake them in a 350 degree oven for 15 minutes.
Frying the bottoms of the meatballs.
If you’re making these on the stovetop, heat up two tablespoons of olive oil over medium heat in a saucepot, then fry the bottoms of the meatballs for a few minutes so they’re evenly browned. Add a tablespoon of minced garlic and stir for about 30 seconds. After that, add a 15-ounce can of tomato sauce, two teaspoons of smoked paprika, 1/2 teaspoon of cumin, 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne, and a bit of salt and pepper to taste. Simmer for about ten minutes, then serve. For a potluck, just toss the cooked meatballs into a crock pot, stir in all the sauce ingredients, and heat on low for about 2-3 hours before serving. You can easily make the meatballs the night before and put them in cold, but put the crock pot on high instead of low so the meatballs are heated through. Voila, you’ve impressed your co-workers!
Keto Spanish Meatballs
These flavorful meatballs are great for a potluck or a tapas night.
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and line a cookie sheet with aluminum foil.
Mix all the meatball ingredients together in a large bowl, then shape into 20 equally-sized balls. Space them evenly on the cookie sheet and bake for 15 minutes.
For the Sauce
Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil over medium heat in a large saucepan. Fry the bottoms of the meatballs for 3 minutes, then add the minced garlic and stir for 30 seconds. Stir in the remaining ingredients and simmer over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, for 10 minutes.
To make the meatballs in a crock pot instead of on the stovetop, simply add all the sauce ingredients into the crock pot with the meatballs and cook on low for 2-3 hours. If you made the meatballs the night before and they're still cold, reheat on high instead of low.
Macros per serving (4 meatballs with sauce): 418 calories, 9 grams net carbs, 28 grams protein, 28 grams fat.
Keyword beef, high protein, keto, low carb, potluck
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I’ve been on a kick of trying to make keto versions of regional food, especially now that the chaffle craze has made it so I can make a decent sandwich now. I’ve made Hot Browns, Nashville Hot Chicken, Biscuits and Gravy, and Beef on Weck so far, among other things. What’s your favorite food from where you live? Let me know and I’ll try to make it.
I used to do a lot of tailgating for college football, and we’d try to do a theme around the food from our opponents. Wings from when we played Buffalo, West Virginia dogs, that sort of thing. For the Nebraska game, we made Runzas, which are sandwiches made of bread stuffed with a beef and cabbage or sauerkraut mixture. Fairly simple, but it won’t work with chaffles because it’s a stuffed sandwich. That’s where the fathead dough comes in. Fathead dough is made with melted mozzarella and cream cheese combined with almond flour and egg. The cheese gives it a stretchy texture almost like actual dough. I’ve seen people use it for almost everything, even sweetened and turned into pastry! It works really well for stuffing things, so you could easily make things like empanadas with it. Or, in this case, recreating an old tailgate food.
This recipe makes a dozen sandwiches. Fathead dough freezes pretty well, so if you’re not making these for a crowd, feel free to pop your extras in the freezer and save them for a week where you don’t have time to make lunches for yourself. Just make sure you thaw them out before you reheat them.
Start by preheating your oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. You’ll need a couple of cookie sheets, which you’ll be rotating in and out of the oven one at a time. You can only really fit three of these per sheet unless you want to risk tearing them as you transfer them onto the sheet. So prepare those by lining them with parchment paper, and setting them aside for now.
In a large, deep skillet (like this one) over medium heat, saute one medium chopped onion (about 3/4 cup total) in a bit of avocado oil spray until it starts to turn golden brown. Turn up the heat to medium high and add a pound and a half of ground beef, two teaspoons of salt, a half teaspoon of garlic powder, and way more black pepper than you think you’ll need. Break the beef up into pieces as small as you can. When it’s fully browned, drain off the fat. You want it to eventually be as dry as possible, otherwise it’ll be soggy once it’s cooked. Once it’s drained, return it to the pan and add a bag of angel hair slaw. Mine was ten ounces. If you can’t find it in bagged form, just thinly shred a head of cabbage with a food processor or chop it as thin as you can get it. Put it in the pan, add at least another teaspoon of salt and even more black pepper, and cook it, stirring frequently, until the cabbage is cooked and all of the liquid from it has evaporated. If it’s just starting to stick to the bottom of the pan, you’re in a good place. Remove it from the heat and let it sit to cool while you make your dough.
For the fathead dough, you’ll want to make it in two batches, because the dough will lose its elasticity as it melts and you won’t be able to get everything done before that. Start with 12 ounces of mozzarella cheese and 2 ounces of cream cheese. Put it in the microwave for 30 seconds on high, take the bowl out, and stir. Put it back in and repeat in 30 second increments until the cheese is melted into a ball. Be careful not to burn it! In my microwave it usually only takes a minute. When the cheese is nice and melty and stretchy, add 6 ounces of almond flour, two beaten eggs, and two teaspoons of baking powder. Stir with a spoon at first, but eventually you’ll probably need to get your hands dirty. Spray them with oil to avoid sticking. Once everything is well-mixed, divide it into two equally-sized balls, and then divide each one of those into three equal parts. This will end up making six sandwiches.
Go back to your parchment-lined cookie sheets and put three of your small balls on it. Flatten each one out until it’s thin and about 6 inches in diameter. You’ll want to spray your hands with oil to do this, otherwise your hands will stick. Once you have the three circles ready, work on the filling. Using a slotted spoon, put about 1/2 cup of filling on one side of the circle. Make sure any liquid is drained before you put it on your dough. Once you’ve added the filling, fold the other half of the circle on top and line up the edges. Using the back of a fork that you’ve sprayed with cooking spray, press the tines against the edges of the dough to seal it up, then prick holes in the top of the dough four times so that steam can let out when they cook. If the fork starts to stick, just keep spraying it. I found that one spray would work to complete one sandwich.
One stuffed and sealed, one stuffed but not sealed, and one ready to be folded so you can see what the filling is supposed to look like.
Put the three stuffed and sealed runzas in the oven for 12-15 minutes, until they’re golden brown. While they’re cooking, repeat with the remaining three balls on your second prepared cookie sheet. You should finish with plenty of time. Once the first batch is out, put the second batch in, and move the first runzas to a cooling rack or to a warmer if you want to serve them all immediately. Let the cookie sheet cool while you make another batch of fathead dough. This time, form the runzas on a piece of parchment paper on your counter, and move the parchment paper to the cookie sheet, so it has time to finish cooling and won’t melt the dough while you’re working with it. Keep doing this until you’ve made all 12. Enjoy your keto Nebraska tailgate, or just do what I did and make them for lunches!
Keto Runzas
Fathead dough sandwiches stuffed with a ground beef and cabbage mixture.
10ouncesbagged angel hair slawor very thinly sliced cabbage
For the Fathead Dough
24ouncesshredded mozzarella cheese
4ouncescream cheese
12ouncesalmond flour
4eggsbeaten
4tspbaking powder
cooking sprayas needed
Instructions
For the Filling
Spray a deep nonstick skillet with cooking spray. Saute the chopped onion over medium heat until they begin to turn golden brown on the edges.
Turn the heat up to medium-high and add the ground beef, two teaspoons of salt, a heavy amount of black pepper, and garlic powder. Brown the beef, making sure to break it up into the smallest possible crumbles. Once the beef is browned, drain it and return it to the pan.
Add the angel hair slaw and another teaspoon of salt to the beef mixture and cook, stirring frequently, until the cabbage is fully cooked and the liquid is evaporated, about 10 minutes. Add additional salt and pepper to taste, then remove from the heat to cool while you make the dough.
For the Fathead Dough
Preheat oven to 400 before beginning.
Once the beef is cooling, begin to make the dough. In a large microwave-safe bowl, add 12 ounces of the cheese and 2 ounces of the cream cheese. Microwave on high at 30 second intervals, stirring between each one, until the cheese is melted. Make sure the cheese doesn't burn.
Add 6 ounces of almond flour, two teaspoons of baking powder, and two of the beaten eggs to the bowl. Mix with a spoon or oiled hands until the dough is uniform in color and consistency.
Filling and Baking Instructions
Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper.
Take the fathead dough and divide it in half, then divide each half into thirds.
Press out three balls of dough into 6-7" circles on one of the cookie sheets. Using a slotted spoon to drain any remaining liquid, put approximately 1/2 cup of the beef filling on one half of the circles, then fold the other half over the top to make a half-circle shape.
Spray the back of the tines of a fork with cooking spray, and press it around the rounded edge of the circle to crimp and seal it shut. Repeat with the remaining two circles, adding more cooking spray if the fork sticks. Prick the top of each sandwich four times with the fork, then bake for 12-15 minutes, until golden brown.
While the first three bake, repeat with the remaining three balls of dough on the second cookie sheet. Remove the first sheet from the oven and put the cooked runzas on a cooling rack or in a warmer if you plan to serve them immediately. Let the first cookie sheet cool while the second one cooks.
Use the rest of the ingredients to make the remaining fathead dough while the second cookie sheet is in the oven. Using the above instructions, assemble the next three sandwiches on a sheet of parchment paper on the counter, then carefully move it to the cooled cookie sheet. Repeat again for the remaining 3 sandwiches.
Macros per serving: 504 calories, 6 grams net carbs, 37 grams protein, 35 grams fat.
Keyword beef, fathead, high protein, keto, lchf, low carb, sandwich
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I can’t remember the first time I had picadillo, but it was instant love. Spiced beef mixed with capers and olives, raisins and potatoes. Well, I can’t have those last two anymore, but the good news is that it’s actually even better without them. I’m not big on sweet and savory, even though it actually works for this particular dish. And the potatoes are mainly just unnecessary carbs. So instead I’m just eating savory and salty, and it works out well. This is also a great recipe for meal prep, because it’s quick and to make and both freezes and reheats well.
By quick and easy, I mean that this might be the shortest recipe post I’ve ever made. Start out with 2 pounds of ground beef. I used 93% lean because that was what was on sale, but normally I’d use 85%. My macros count 93% lean, so make sure you adjust for that if you use something different. Chop up a small onion (I ended up with about 2/3 cup) and half a green pepper. Throw all of this into a large Dutch oven or deep non-stick skillet, add two tablespoons of cumin, a tablespoon of oregano, a tablespoon of garlic, a teaspoon of salt, and several grinds of black pepper. Brown the beef over medium-high heat, breaking it up as it cooks. Once the beef is browned, add a can (about 1.75 cups) of tomato sauce and two tablespoons of capers. Reduce the heat to low and simmer for ten minutes or so, until the onions and pepper are soft, then add 12 halved jumbo pimiento-stuffed green olives. Serve it by itself or over cauliflower rice. See? Literally one paragraph of description. The recipe will almost be redundant.
Keto Cuban Picadillo
Salty and savory, this Cuban recipe is great for meal-prep.
Add the ground beef, peppers, onions, garlic, cumin, oregano, salt, and pepper to a Dutch oven or deep non-stick skillet over medium high heat. Cook, stirring the beef to crumble it, until the beef is browned.
Add the tomato sauce and capers and simmer until the peppers and onions are soft, about 10 minutes. Add the olives and remove from heat. Serve alone or with cauliflower rice.
Macros per serving, using 93% lean beef: 286 calories, 7 net carbs, 32 grams protein, 13 grams fat.
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