Swedish meatballs are probably one of the best-known Swedish cooking specialties. IKEA made Swedish meatballs popular in this country and I am very grateful. There are so many different version of Swedish meatball, depending on the region the recipe came from and of course personal tastes. I must have read twenty recipes for Swedish Meatballs before deciding on this particular combination of ingredients.
Ingredients:
1 lb ground pork
1 lb ground beef
1 egg
1 slice of wheat bread
1/4 cup milk
1/2 cup finely chopped onion
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
salt, black ground pepper
3 tbs olive oil
1/2 cup flour, for rolling the meatballs
For Sauce:
3 tbs butter
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
3 cups beef broth
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup sour cream
salt, pepper
2 tbs minced fresh dill weed
Directions:
Preheat the large skillet on medium heat and add the oil.
1. In a deep dish, place the slice of bread and pour the milk over it. Set aside
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine ground beef, ground pork, chopped onion, egg, nutmeg, allspice, salt and pepper.
3. Squeeze most of the milk out of the bread and crumble it into the meat
4. Mix all very well until completely combined
5. Dust your hands with flour, scoop out the meat with soup spoon and roll the meatballs (about 1 inch size meatballs). Keep lightly dusting with flour while rolling the meat into the ball.
6. Add the meatballs into the hot skillet. Cook covered on medium heat until completely cooked flipping half way through.
7. Take out the meatballs and save the meat juice. I used the juice from the meatballs in the sauce
8. Heat the butter in the skillet that you used for meatballs over medium heat
9. Add the flour and whisk to form a roux
10. Add the meatball meat juice slowly while stirring constantly.
11. Slowly add the beef stock, do not stop stirring. Whisk until smooth.
12. Add the salt, pepper, heavy cream and sour cream. Whisk until combined. Bring to boil (still on medium) and and add the minced dill weed.
13. Add the meatballs to the sauce. Cook together for about 5-7 minutes.
~Can be served with pasta, roasted potatoes or mashed potatoes.
Enjoy!!
* I am linking this recipe to the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday PARTIES. Why don’t you visit the wonderful hosts and link some of your own projects!?
Katerina
Beautiful meatballs! We have something similar in Greece too!
Linda
Looks delicious!!
Tiffany @ Eat at Home
These look fantastic!
Kelley @ TheGrantLife.com
(found ya on a link party)
This looks great! I love swedish meatballs but never thought to make my own meatballs. Thanks for the recipe! š
BigBearswife
I’ve never tried Swedish meatballs, but they do look good
sugarspiceiced
These look fantastic!! I love eating Swedish Meatballs at IKEA! I have even bought them from their freezer section to make at home. I’ll have to try this recipe from scratch sometime. Thanks for sharing it!!
Ashley
might just have to try these!! thanks for sharing:)
http://jaysonandashley.blogspot.com/
Casa De Luna
Yum! Bring on the lingonberries!
Lindsay
Is that really all there is to it?? I have got to try this! I always thought it was much more complicated. Great job! Thanks so much for sharing this @ Show & Share! I am so happy that you did!
Emily
thanks so much for linking up to Tasty Tuesday! can’t wait to see what you’ll bring this week. http://nap-timecreations.blogspot.com/
Cathy@LemonTreeDwelling
This looks like one of those comfort dishes you NEED when it’s cold outside! My family would devour these!!
lyuba
Thank you, Cathy!
My boys requested even in the summer š
Matilda
Amazing to see a version of Swedish meatballs outside of Sweden. Though that was a very local dish
The traditional way here, is to serve them with boiled potatoes, lingonberry jelly, pickled cucumber and sauce.
If you lose the dill in the sauce, and the nutmeg and the allspice in the meatballs you’ll be even closer to the original.
And instead of flour on the hands while rolling, dip the hands in water š
But I’ll try to sell this recipe to the family, not sure if I can convince them to have dill in their beloved sauce though;)
Love, the girl from IKEA land
lyuba
Thanks for letting me know that I was close š Unfortunately, I’ve never been to Sweden but it’s always great to know the authentic way of cultural cooking! Thanks, Matilda!
Matilda
Great blog you have by the way!
And if you would be planning a trip to Sweden,
Wait at least until May or June:)
By then the ices have melted and the weather would hopefully be at its best behaviour;)
lyuba
Thank you!
We are actually going to Russia in May (home for me). Some day, I’d like to travel the while Europe š
Rebecca
Hi!
Totally agree with Matilda, you should drop the dill and nutmeg. š Also, most of us swedes doesn’t use a whole slice of bread in milk (never heard of!), instead we just use some plain bread crumbs in the mix. Another thing I thought about is that we don’t cook the meatballs in the sauce, we fry them by them selves first and then make the sauce in the same pan after to get all the flavours. š
lyuba
Thank you for the suggestions, Rebecca! The meatballs are actually not cooked in the cause, they are cooked first, taken out and then added back to the sauce. The bread is something that my grandmother used to always do when making meatballs, so that’s my own little touch. I like it that way so I shared it š This is my take on the recipe but I will definitely try your suggestions!
Jessica
I’m Swedish and live in Sweden (as I see someone else above do as well) and I must admit I’ve not seen meatballs like this – BUT that is NO critique, so I do not mean it in a bad way at all š And as you say; there are many different kinds (the basic is more or less always ground beef/pork, onion, black pepper, egg, breadcrumbs+milk/water or cream and salt). Anyways, I found the photo of your meatballs on Google; thought they looked different and delicious so I clicked – and after reading the recipe I’m definitely gonna try this some day š I’m in a come-up-with-new-kind-of-meatballs-spree so it’s fun to go outside “the Swedish meatball-thinking” and see what people abroad do and come up with š Anyway, great page and lovely photos! š
lyuba
Thank you for your comment, Jessica! Every cook definitely has their own touch to recipes. My main though on trying to cook an authentic recipe from a different cuisine is the ingredients. Not all ingredients are available or even the same in every country. For example, my Russian dishes (and I am Russian, born and raised) never come out the same here as they did in Russia. And that is due to the difference in ingredients.
I’m glad you like my version and I do hope that you try it! They came out delicious!
JillGruetz
My recipe handed down from my Swedish grandmother (born in 1899) had cardamom, nutmeg and allspice in the recipe (I used a scant amount of allspice and cardamom.) It called for soaking bread in milk and used a mixture of beef, pork and veal. Fry in butter and use the pan drippings for the gravy. I still make them for our family. We like to serve with Swedish Rye Bread. I just found your site and am enjoying perusing. Thank you very much.
Sasha
I made these for some friends yesterday & we all LOVED them! The nutmeg & allspice made them especially delicious. Your website is beautiful & will be my go-to spot to find recipes for every cooking occasion. Thank you!