Greek Meatballs and Quinoa Salad is a light and easy meal with Mediterranean flavor.
I love multiple things about this recipe. First, ground turkey meatballs are laced with spinach, feta cheese, and seasonings. They pair perfectly with the store-bought Tzatziki sauce, but you can also opt to make your own. Next, there’s the colorful quinoa salad, which combines the goodness of protein-packed grains with cool cucumbers, herbs, cherry tomatoes, kalamata olives, and feta.
Back Story of a Recipe
I started by wanting to cook something new and tasty. While this meal would be delightful anytime, I was in the mood for a light summer meal. My motivations were the warmer temperatures and my desire to stay healthy for the summer wardrobe. Fortunately, this recipe scores well on both points.
Greek Meatballs and Quinoa Salad Tweaks & Tips
Heartier Appetities—To adapt this recipe to heartier appetites, slice the meatballs in half and tuck them in some pita bread. Then top it like a gyro, adding sliced red onion, sliced tomatoes, shredded lettuce, and tzatziki sauce. You can also dip the pita bread into the Tzatziki sauce as a side dish idea.
Quinoa Salad Reboot—The Original recipe served cherry tomatoes and sliced cucumbers as a side dish for the meatballs and salad. I found the original EatingWell recipe for the salad a tad bland, so I added the veggies, feta, and more salt and pepper (all modifications are included in my version of the recipe.)
Making and Cooking Meatballs
Here’s the basic method for squeezing the moisture out of the spinach before adding it to the meatballs. However, you start with thawed frozen spinach instead of wilting Swiss chard, as indicated in the recipe link above. You can thaw the spinach at room temperature or on a lower setting in the microwave.
The pan-browned meatballs need a little babysitting to brown nicely on all sides. Because I prepared them in advance, I stopped cooking them when they reached 130 degrees vs. the recommended 165%. But after letting them cool down ( the cooking process continues during this time), I discovered they were already browned through.
To Reheat the Meatballs, I sliced them in half and reheated them for 1 1/2 -2 minutes on medium heat. This kept them tender and prevented them from drying out.
Tzatziki Sauce–The amusing part of the EatingWell recipe was the 1/4 cup of Tzatziki sauce allocated for four servings of meatballs and salad. Seriously? Maybe it’s because I am a massive fan of Ztatziki, but I recommended buying a 10-ounce container to serve four people.
Meal Prep
These Greek Meatballs and Quinoa Salad are convenient options for a multi-day meal prep strategy. Warm the meatballs in the microwave and serve the salad with tzatziki sauce on the side,
More Meatball Recipes
If you’re as big a fan as I am of meatball recipes, check out some of these other delicious options.
Greek Meatballs with Quinoa Salad
Ingredients
- 1 cup frozen chopped spinach thawed
- 1 pound 93%-lean ground turkey
- 1 cup crumbled feta cheese divided
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano
- 1 teaspoon salt divided
- 1 teaspoon ground pepper divided
- cooking spray
- 2 cups cooked quinoa cooled
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 2 tablespoon olive oil
- ½ cup chopped parsley
- 1/3 cup sliced kalamata olives
- 3 tablespoons chopped mint
- 1 cup chopped cucumber
- 1 cup halved cherry tomatoes
- 1 cup tzatziki
- pita bread optional
Instructions
- Squeeze excess moisture from spinach. Combine the spinach with turkey, feta, garlic powder, oregano, 1/8 teaspoon salt and 1/8 teaspoon pepper in a medium bowl; mix well. Form the mixture into 12 meatballs. Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Coat with cooking spray. Working in batches if necessary, add the meatballs to the pan and cook until browned on all sides and no longer pink in the center, about 10 to 12 minutes. (An instant-read thermometer inserted in the center should register 165°F.) Set the meatballs aside to cool. Note – If prepping in advance, cook to 130 degrees and they will be at proper temperature after reheating in the microwave for a minute or two,
- Combine quinoa, lemon juice, olive oil, parsley, mint, cucumbers, kalamata olives, and the remaining 1/2 teaspoon each salt and pepper, and 1/2 cup feta in a medium bowl. Divide among 4 plates or single-serving lidded containers. Top each with 3 meatballs and serve with ztatziki sauce.
Cathy: I made this dish for Gary and me and we both really enjoyed it.
As Gary is not a fan of quinoa, I subbed orzo but kept the rest of the salad ingredients and
seasoning. Also took your suggestion to buy the 10oz container of Tzatziki sauce as Gary is, like you, a huge fan of sauces. Thanks so much for these delicious recipes! Hope all is well!
It great to hear from you and that you enjoyed the recipe! I love your orzo substitution idea. I’ve been busy with a variety of projects and life changes lately so the recipes are fewer, but I still enjoy messing up the kitchen and sharing an occasional food post. Love to you and Gary.