Mediterranean(ish) Bowl
I love a meal that can be served in one of my favorite shallow pasta bowls. I don’t know why but I have loved this shape of bowl since I was a kid, and nowadays bowl meals are so in, protein bowls, buddha bowls, taco bowls, the list goes on.
Last night I created a delicious Mediterranean(ish) bowl meal. I took some of my favorite flavors and created a healthy tasty dish. Spinach, Quinoa, and oven baked Chicken & Turkey meatballs all tossed with a fresh tomato cucumber salsa and drizzled with Greek Yogurt Sauce; each bite had a new mouth tingling flavor profile.
This is a great meal prep menu too; the meatball mixture makes about 25 good size balls and they can easily be frozen for future meals. I only baked out 8 of them for our meal, 3 or 4 is the perfect serving size.
To make the quinoa I use my rice cooker, 2 cups of dry quinoa to 4 cups of liquid. If you don’t have a rice cooker you can easily make it on the stove top, here is more info. I use 1/2 water and 1/2 chicken broth to cook the quinoa, and when it’s done, I fluff it up with a fork and season with 2 tablespoons of butter for a richer flavor.
With online grocery shopping being how I shop these days I have found that buying packages of cherry tomatoes is a better way to go than full-size tomatoes. You can’t seem to count on an online shopper picking you out good produce and the cherry tomatoes seem to always be decent. I knew I wanted to use up some tomatoes in this dish, but what would I toss them with? Well instead of using cucumber in my Greek Yogurt Sauce like a tzatziki I decided to dice the cucumber and toss with the tomatoes and a minced green onion for a fresh Mediterranean(ish) salsa.
To assemble the entire bowl, I started with shredding up baby spinach in the bottom of the bowl, next about 1/2 cup of the quinoa, topped with 3 or 4 meatballs. I then drizzled the Greek Yogurt Sauce around the dish and topped it all with spoonful’s of the fresh tomato salsa. Simple and delicious!
What are your favorite bowl meals? Let me know in the comments below.
Mediterranean(ish) Bowls
Ingredients
Meatballs
- 1 pound ground turkey
- 1 pound ground chicken
- 16 ounce frozen spinach, chopped thawed and squeezed dry
- 4 cloves garlic minced
- 6 ounce crumbled Feta
- 1 teaspoon thyme dried
- 1 teaspoon oregano dried
- 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 cup panko more or less
Greek Yogurt Sauce
- 1/2 cup Greek Yogurt
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 lemon juice and zest
- 2 teaspoons dill dried
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
Salsa
- 1 cup chopped cherry tomato I like to cut cherry tomatoes into quarters
- 1 green onion cut lengthwise and then minced
- 1/2 English cucumber peeled and diced
- splash red wine vinegar
- splash olive oil
- pinch salt
- pinch pepper
For the Bowl
- Baby Spinach chopped
- quinoa cooked
Instructions
Meatballs
- Preheat oven to 375
- Mix all ingredients (except the panko) in a bowl, clean hands are best for getting it all mixed together.
- The eggs make for a wet mixture so add at least 1/2 cup panko or more to dry and bring together.
- Form mixture into approximately 25 small golfball size meatballs. Place them all on a baking sheet and chill for 20 minutes or so.
- Once chilled bake the desired amount in the preheated oven, I baked mine on a parchment paper lined baking sheet for easy clean up.
- Gently place the meatballs you aren't baking in storage bags and freeze for later.
- Bake for 25 minutes, turn them over 1/2 way thru.
Greek Yogurt Sauce
- Whisk all the ingredients togehter, chill till ready.
Fresh Salsa
- Mix the chopped tomatoes, green onion, and cucumber together. Drizzle with a splash of red wine vinegar and olive oil. Toss together and season with salt and pepper, set aside till ready.
Assemble
- In a shallow bowl fill the bottom with the chopped baby spinach, add a 1/2 cup of quinoa on top, the warm quinoa will wilt the fresh baby spinach.
- Add 3-4 meatballs on top of the quinoa and drizzle the dressing around the bowl, i used about 2 tablespoons or so.
- Top the meatballs with the fresh salsa and serve!
