Stir-fried fall veggies team up with pasta and frozen cooked meatballs for a quick dinner before trick-or-treating on Halloween night. For fun, you can pretend the curly pasta looks like worms and the meatballs like eyeballs.
Goblins Pasta Dinner
45 ml (3 tbsp) each ketchup and rice wine or cider vinegar
30 ml (2 tbsp) each sodium-reduced soy sauce and granulated sugar
15 ml (1 tbsp) cornstarch
500 ml (2 cups) uncooked curly twisted vegetable pasta
30 ml (2 tbsp) vegetable oil
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
Get daily National news
1 clove garlic, minced
7 ml (1 1/2 tsp) finely grated ginger root
250 g (8 oz) Swedish cooked meatballs (about 500 ml/2 cups)
500 ml (2 cups) broccoli florets
1 small sweet red pepper, thinly sliced
375 ml (1 1/2 cups) beef broth
In a small bowl or measuring cup, whisk together ketchup, vinegar, soy sauce, sugar and cornstarch until smooth; set aside.
Cook pasta according to package directions, omitting salt; drain and toss with 5 ml (1 tsp) of the oil. Cover to keep warm.
Meanwhile, in a large deep non-stick skillet, heat remaining oil over medium heat; stir-fry onion for 1 to 2 minutes or until softened. Stir in garlic, ginger and meatballs; stir-fry until meatballs are slightly browned, 3 to 4 minutes.
Add broccoli and red pepper; stir-fry for 2 to 3 minutes. Add broth; cover, bring to a boil and cook for 3 to 4 minutes or until broccoli is crisp-tender.
Stir cornstarch mixture. Push ingredients to side of pan and gradually stir in starch mixture, stirring constantly until thickened. Stir in cooked pasta and heat until hot. Serve in bowls.
Makes 4 servings.
Variation: Substitute turkey or chicken meatballs for the Swedish meatballs and chicken broth for the beef broth.
Nutrition information per serving: 450 calories; 17 g protein; 4 g fat; 46 g carbohydrate.
Source: Foodland Ontario.
Comments
Want to discuss? Please read our Commenting Policy first.