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These TERIYAKI MEATBALLS are juicy, tender, and flavorful. A simple homemade teriyaki sauce is perfect for tossing your homemade beef meatballs in. Serve over rice for a quick dinner.
In our house, we like to get creative with meatballs.
Not only do we season them in a multitude of ways, we also serve them up for a variety of things.
Snack time? Grape Jelly Meatballs.
Dinner? Crockpot Meatball Subs.
Quick lunch? Air Fryer Meatballs with pasta.
Football food? Buffalo Chicken Meatballs.
The thing I love about these teriyaki meatballs is that you can serve them for any occasion! They’re good on a toothpick as an appetizer and they’re delicious and filling over a pile of rice for dinner!
Plus, these homemade teriyaki meatballs are easy and the homemade sauce is so flavorful! Way better than the stuff you find bottled at the grocery store!
These meatballs go great with some white rice, a side of Asian cucumber salad, and our pork egg rolls.
Teriyaki Meatball Ingredients:
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Ground Beef – We use all beef, but you could swap in 1/2 pork if you prefer.
Panko Bread Crumbs
Eggs – Helps to hold everything together!
Seasoning – You’ll need green onion, garlic, soy sauce, and ginger.
What is Panko?
Panko is a Japanese bread crumb that is light, airy, and crispy. It can be found in most any grocery store. We highly recommend using Panko over traditional bread crumbs in any breading recipe where you want a crispy finished product.
Homemade Teriyaki Sauce Ingredients:
Low Sodium Soy Sauce – It’s important to use low sodium here or your sauce will be too salty.
Brown Sugar
Ginger
Garlic
Honey
Cornstarch – We use this to thicken the sauce up a bit.
How To:
Prepare the meatballs: Add all of the ingredients for the meatballs to a mixing bowl and mix well.
Shape: We like to use a medium cookie scoop to shape our meatballs. It makes it easy to get them a consistent size, which is important for them to cook evenly.
My Favorite Cookie Scoop!
We use cookie scoops for everything from baking cookies to scooping meatballs to easily filling muffin tins.
Bake: These meatballs bake in a 400 degree oven in about 15 minutes. Quick, simple, and tasty!
Prepare the sauce: While the meatballs are baking, whip up the teriyaki sauce. Just whisk together the soy sauce, brown sugar, garlic, honey, and ginger with a cup of water. Whisk in a cornstarch slurry and cook until the sauce has thickened.
Helpful Tip!
How to make cornstarch slurry:
A cornstarch slurry is a quick and simple way to thicken a sauce. Just mix together 1 tablespoon of cornstarch with 2 tablespoons of water, until smooth. Whisk into your hot liquid.
Mixing the cornstarch with water prior to adding to hot liquids keeps you from getting a lumpy sauce.
Combine: Once your sauce has thickened to your liking and the meatballs are cooked through, add the sauce and meatballs together and toss them around to coat.
What to serve with teriyaki meatballs?
We’re big fans of rice in this house, so a big pile of perfectly cooked rice is the obvious answer for us!
My rice pilaf is an easy way to cook rice that turns out tender and flavorful every time. Keep it simple and add some steamed vegetables on the side. We buy the Asian medley at our local grocery store.
Serve with a side of our sausage egg rolls and bacon fried rice for a really flavorful Asian-inspired meal.
Teriyaki Meatballs
Ingredients
For the meatballs:
- 2 pounds ground beef
- ¾ cup Panko breadcrumbs
- 2 large eggs
- ¼ cup chopped green onions
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 1 tablespoon soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon minced ginger
For the sauce:
- ¼ cup low sodium soy sauce
- ¼ cup brown sugar
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 1 tablespoon honey
- 1 teaspoon minced ginger
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
Instructions
To make the meatballs:
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Add all of the meatball ingredients to a large mixing bowl and use your hands to combine the mixture. Be careful not to overmix.
- Use a medium cookie scoop to scoop out balls of the mixture and roll gently into a meatball.
- Place the meatballs evenly spaced on the prepared baking sheets and bake for 15 minutes or until cooked through.
To make the sauce:
- While the meatballs are cooking, add the soy sauce, brown sugar, ginger, garlic, honey, and 1 cup of water to a saucepan over medium heat and whisk well to combine.
- Bring sauce to a simmer.
- Add the cornstarch to a small bowl with 2 tablespoons of water and stir with a fork to combine.
- Pour the cornstarch slurry into the simmering sauce and whisk well until the sauce has thickened, about 2 minutes.
For serving:
- Toss the cooked meatballs in the teriyaki sauce to coat.
- Serve over rice or with toothpicks.
- Sprinkle with sesame seeds and chopped green onions, if desired.
Tips & Notes:
Nutrition Information:
This recipe was one of the first on this blog, originally published in January 2009. The recipe itself has been updated along with the photos in 2021. Original photo below.
Aren’t you glad my photography has improved? 😉
Iris Ingram says
This looks and sounds like a delicious recipe. It could easily be halved for fewer guests or you could freeze 1/2 of the meatballs for later use. Thanks for sharing.
EARL WEAVER says
I DO LOVE THIS RECIPE BUT IT MAKES TOO MUCH FOR JUST TWO PEOPLE I NEED RECIPES FOR TWP PEOPLE IF POSSIBLE
Karly says
Hi Earl! You could always halve the recipe. There is a slider in the recipe card that you can adjust the serving size and it will reduce the volume of ingredients for you. 🙂
Sammy says
Hi there! This is my 1st comment here so I just wanted to give a quick shout out and tell you I really enjoy reading your posts.
Can you suggest any other blogs/websites/forums that cover the same subjects?
Thanks!
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Sue M says
Thank you for the great recipes. More importantly, thank you for your humor. I laughed out loud!! I will be back….and next time I won’t spend a lot of time googling around looking for something. “I promise.” Sue
golf ball washer says
You rock. World needs more souls like you.
Leslie says
Dave is so “basic” (that’s his fancy word for “picky”) that not only will he refuse to eat meatballs with onions or gated carrot, he’d refuse to eat teriyaki flavor! This sounds delicious, though. And you take such good pictures of it all. How do you do that? My food pictures are the worst.
Foodista says
Seriously, I had fun reading this post. Hope you can share this recipe over at Foodista. We have launched an online food and cooking encyclopedia ala wikipedia. Add a recipe and you can win a $100 gift card to Sur la table. Don’t forget to register first so we know who to thank the recipe for. Thanks!
Donna says
Great pictures and recipe. I usually don’t laugh while reading the recipe instructions – I love your humor. And – darn it – my husband won’t eat meatloaf!
Cameron says
I loves me some meatballs. And I must declare, I am as picky as your dear Cleatus. If I so much as find a hint of onion in anything, I start to throw a fit like a three year old.
Amber says
These look delish! The stovetop is inspired! I actually use stovetop in place of breadcrumbs on baked pork chops. And instead of eggs, I use italian dressing. It is YUMMY.