Buffalo Chicken Meatballs

Made with all that classic flavor of buffalo chicken wings, complete with traditional celery and carrots, these Buffalo Chicken Meatballs make for a fun weeknight dinner or meal prep idea! Double or triple the batch and serve some for now and save some for later. Serve with your favorite ranch or bleu cheese dipping sauce and serve it up as an app, or pair it with some cooked spaghetti squash or pasta and and you’ve got the perfect meal!

Gluten-Free Buffalo Chicken Meatballs

I am a giant fan of just about buffalo anything. Just type buffalo in the search bar up above and you’ll see that we have nearly anything buffalo you can think of, except Buffalo Chicken Meatballs. So we went right ahead and fixed that with this recipe! These meatballs have all that traditional flavor, including celery and carrots right in them, but re-imagined as a meatball! You can serve these as an appetizer at a party, or pair it up with a side dish for a fun weeknight dinner! We promise, you’re going to love this one! Plus we’re sharing our tips for working with chicken meatballs, which can be notoriously tricky to work with!

How to Make Buffalo Sauce

Think you need to buy buffalo sauce? Don’t, because it’s super easy to make at home! It requires only two ingredients: hot sauce and butter! You can even make it dairy-free by substituting in ghee for butter, if you need to. To make it simply whisk the two ingredients together in a simmering saucepan and then you’ll have homemade buffalo sauce!

Tips for Making Chicken Meatballs

Making gluten-free meatballs with ground turkey or chicken can be a little tricky. Follow these best practices to make for the best chicken meatballs!

1. Don’t use ground chicken breast. It will be too dry. Stick to a mix of dark meat and white meat, or just use dark meat. If you can’t find ground chicken already in the case, check with the butcher to see if they can grind up some chicken thighs for you fresh!
2. Work with very cold meat! The colder the meat mixture, the easier it is to work with. We’ve even stuck the meatballs in the freezer for 10-15 minutes to shape them better when need be.
3. Use a cookie scoop to portion out the meatballs to ensure even-sized meatballs. If you are baking them, you can scoop them directly onto the baking sheet (though they won’t technically be completely round)
4. You can either pan-sear or bake the meatballs. Baking is certainly easier, but pan-searing adds a nice flavor to the meatballs. See below for more details.

Baking Vs. Pan-Searing

There are two ways to cook these meatballs. It is a little bit extra working to pan-sear these meatballs, but we love the browning that happens with this cooking method, so this is our preferred way of making them. However, if you want to bake them for a more hands-off cooking approach, feel free to do it that way.

Serving Buffalo Chicken Meatballs

Serve these meatballs as is with some celery, carrots, extra buffalo sauce and either ranch or bleu cheese dressing! Or you can make this a meal by pairing the meatballs with a side such as cauliflower rice, white rice, spaghetti squash or even a big bowl of roasted veggies!

Watch the video:

If you like this buffalo sauce recipe, check out these others:

• Crispy Buffalo Chicken Bites
• Buffalo Chicken Burgers
• Buffalo Chicken Tenders (Keto)
• 5-Ingredient Buffalo Chicken Baked Hummus Dip
• Buffalo Chicken Chili (Instant Pot or Stove Top)

Buffalo Chicken Meatballs

5 from 2 votes

Made with all the flavorings of buffalo chicken wings, complete with traditional celery and carrots, these Buffalo Chicken Meatballs make for a fun weeknight dinner or meal prep solution! Double or triple the batch and serve some for now and save some for later. Serve with your favorite ranch or bleu cheese dipping sauce and serve it up as apps, or pair it with some cooked spaghetti squash or pasta and and you’ve got the perfect meal!

Servings 18 meatballs

Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

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Ingredients

  

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For Meatballs:

• 1 lb. organic ground chicken or turkey dark meat is best
• 1 carrot finely minced
• 1 celery rib finely minced
• 2 green onions finely sliced
• 2 cloves garlic finely minced
• 2 tablespoons hot sauce
• ¼ cup almond flour
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon black pepper

For Buffalo Sauce:

• 3 tablespoons butter
• ½ cup hot sauce

Instructions

To Bake:

• Preheat oven to 400 and lightly grease a rimmed baking sheet.
• Add all meatball ingredients to a bowl and mix well. Place mixture into the freezer for 5-10 minutes to thoroughly chill.
• Form mixture into 1-½” meatballs and place on baking sheet.
• Bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes, or until meatballs reach an internal temperature of 165ºF.
• Broil for 2-3 minutes until lightly browned on the tops, if desired.
• Add the butter and the hot sauce to a small pot and heat over medium. Whisk together. 
• Add meatballs and ½ of buffalo sauce together in a large bowl and toss until coated. 
• Transfer to a platter and serve with the reserved buffalo sauce, ranch or blue cheese dipping sauce, and cut up carrots and celery.

To Pan-Sear:

• Add all meatball ingredients to a bowl and mix well. Place mixture into the freezer for 5-10 minutes to thoroughly chill.
• Form mixture into 1-½” meatballs and place on baking sheet.
• Add oil to a large cast iron skillet and heat over medium. Once hot, sear meatballs, in batches, on all sides, about 3-4 minutes per side, and until the internal temperature reaches 165ºF.
• Place cooked meatballs in a large bowl.
• Meanwhile, add the butter and the hot sauce to a small pot and heat over medium. Whisk together. 
• Pour half of the buffalo sauce into the bowl, and mix it together with the meatballs.
• Transfer to a platter and serve with the reserved buffalo sauce, ranch or blue cheese dipping sauce, and cut up carrots and celery.

Nutrition

Serving: 2meatballsCalories: 152kcalCarbohydrates: 5gProtein: 10gFat: 10gSaturated Fat: 4gCholesterol: 66mgSodium: 600mgFiber: 1gSugar: 4g

Course: Appetizer

Cuisine: American

Author: Lexi

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