Meatless Meatballs

Hello my little lovelies!

So for my second veggie recipe I wanted to be a little creative and I made meatless meatballs! These guys are perfect for spaghetti and meatballs or if you're throwing a party and you have friends that are vegetarian. These are quick and easy to assemble so you're not doing too much to these guys. And again, all the seasonings will be to your taste, so I'm just going to put the seasonings that I used and then you guys can adjust it to your taste buds.

So let's get started!

The things you will need:

• 2 cans of black beans
• 1/2 corn
• 1 cup of rice or quinoa
• Salt and pepper to taste
• garlic powder
• onion powder
• paprika
• completely optional: Tabasco or hot sauce of your choice

1. Rinse and drain your black beans in the sink in a strainer. Let them dry a little bit.
2. Put them in a bowl and mash them up. Make sure to not completely mash them because you want some texture with the meatball, but do mash them well.
3. After the beans are mashed up to your liking, then go ahead and add in the corn and mix it in. If you want more of a smoother consistency for the meatballs then mash them completely.
4. For your binder, add in the rice. For better results add in warm rice so that you can mash it a little bit and it will mix a little better with the beans and the corn.
5. Add in all the seasonings to your liking. You guys can swap out whatever seasoning you like; this is just my basic seasonings for everything.
6. Take two tablespoons of the mixture (or a little less) and form in into balls. If you don't want it to stick, put a little bit of coconut oil on your hands. When you finish each meatball put it on a greased baking sheet as those guys love to stick.
7. Stick them in the fridge for about 30 minutes to an hour to let them firm up.
8. You have two options of cooking these: you can stick them straight in the oven at 450 for about 15-20 minutes or you can pan fry it in coconut oil first to get it nice and crispy on the outside first then stick them in the oven at the same temperature for about 15 minutes.

For the corn, if you don't want to put corn in the recipe, go ahead and use another vegetable. Carrot is a good one to put in here as well, just make sure to squeeze out any liquid that comes from it if there is any when you grate it. Grating any type of solid vegetables is the best way to incorporate it in this recipe if you want to use something else other than corn. I just love the combo of corn and black beans.

When I made this recipe I paired it with white rice because it's all the starch I have in my pantry aside from pasta. I put six meatballs with each meal. And for a sauce, I wanted something a little on the sweet side so I just mixed some almond butter, coconut oil and some honey. If you're vegan you can swap out agave nectar. This sauce can also go with desserts too it was just that good.

I hope you guys enjoy this recipe, if you guys try it please let me know if you like it and I will see you guys on the next post!