Want buffalo wings WITHOUT the mess?! Buffalo Chicken Meatballs a poppable combination of spicy sauce, chicken, and celery with blue cheese for dipping!
I love all things buffalo. If you’re a Real Housemoms fan, you’ll know this already… I’ve got TONS of buffalo recipes, including this completely craveable buffalo chicken dip! These Buffalo Chicken Meatballs with Blue Cheese are no exception – they’re moist, spicy, and delicious BUT, they don’t get your fingers messy like chicken wings! They’re the perfect party food for any occasion!
BUFFALO CHICKEN MEATBALLS
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When I was young, Sundays were for cooking at Grandma’s house (looking back, I now realize that for my parents it meant a few hours without kids…seems like a conspiracy to me). We baked, we cooked, we developed new recipes, we had a great time laughing and spending time together. My all-time favorite thing to cook with my grandma was her juicy Italian meatballs. I think those were what created my deep-rooted love for meatballs.
I still use her recipe for meatballs with my own family, but I’ve become a bit more adventurous lately. I was trying to decide what to make for a neighborhood potluck last week when I realized that I was craving meatballs, but also craving buffalo chicken….when WHAM! It hit me – BUFFALO CHICKEN MEATBALLS!
It was a true stroke of genius. Putting together my two favorite things into one, easy, finger-food style dish was one of my greatest accomplishments to date (ok, ok, I exaggerate, but in all seriousness – this chicken meatball recipe is a keeper).
Ingredients for Buffalo Chicken Meatballs and Blue Cheese Sauce
One thing I love about this recipe is that you get the spicy deliciousness of a crispy buffalo wing, but with a lighter, healthier (less guilt-wrenching) kick! I keep the calorie count down by using reduced-fat and light ingredients wherever possible. Plus ground chicken meatballs are more health-conscious than the ground beef you’d use in typical meatballs!
For the chicken balls recipe:
- Ground chicken
- Butter
- Hot sauce
- Salt
- Celery
- Egg
- Bread crumbs
For the blue cheese sauce:
- Light sour cream
- Milk (I use 1%)
- Reduced-fat blue cheese crumbles
- Reduced-fat mayonnaise
- Salt
- Red wine vinegar
How to Make Buffalo Chicken Meatballs
From prepping to cooking to eating, these meatballs only take about 40-45 minutes. Imagine that… in under an hour, you can be eating the most delicious buffalo chicken meatballs you’ve ever had!
- I always start every new cooking endeavor with a great playlist, so after you preheat your oven to 450°F, pop on your favorite tunes and get yourself into the cooking groove!
- In a small pot, add butter and hot sauce on low heat and whisk until butter is melted – when its all combined and smelling spicy and amazing, set the pot aside to cool for about 10 minutes.
- Coat a 9×13 pan with cooking spray
- In a large bowl, combine chicken, salt, chopped fresh celery, egg, bread crumbs, and cooled hot sauce mixture. Now it’s time to get messy – mix that all up with your hands until completely combined. Are they even really meatballs unless you’ve squished them between your fingers??
- Roll the mixture into small balls, packing the meat firmly (wouldn’t want those meatballs to fall apart while baking would we?)
- Place balls evenly in rows on your greased pan
- Bake until the meatballs are firm and cooked through, about 20 minutes
- Cool for about 5 minutes – resist the urge to taste test, if you burn your mouth you won’t be able to fully enjoy them 🙂
- Make the sauce: Combine all ingredients in a bowl and whisk until completely blended
- If desired, drizzle the meatballs with extra hot sauce (I never say no to more hot sauce) and serve with the blue cheese dressing. Be prepared to be asked for this buffalo chicken recipe from all your friends – they’re THAT good!
To make these meatballs even more perfect for your next potluck party, make them tiny enough to be served with toothpicks. This cuts down on the utensils needed and really makes it finger food! Plus, your guests’ fingers will stay clean (and not get orange buffalo sauce all over your nice, white couches).
How Long to Bake Chicken Meatballs
This buffalo chicken recipe has truly been a trial-and-error endeavor for me. But, don’t worry… I’ve got it all figured out for you!
Baking time for meatballs can often be a struggle – cook too quickly and you’ve got a mush of questionably edible meat, cook too long and you’ve got a crisp, dry meat chunk on your hands. The main problem arises with varying size of the meatballs. You want to make sure that you form your meatballs as uniformly as possible to ensure that they cook evenly!
The next thing you’ll want to think about is your uniform meatball size: if you like smaller meatballs (like ones you can pick up with a toothpick), then you’ll probably want to check on them after about 15 minutes in the oven. If you like larger meatballs (like those used for a meatball sub…what a great idea… buffalo chicken meatball subs? YUM) then they’ll probably take closer to 20-25 minutes to bake.
The perfect internal temperature for these ground chicken meatballs is 165°, so if you’re not sure if they’re done or not, pop in a meat thermometer and check where they’re at!
More poppable party bites!
- Meatball Parmesan Bites
- Buffalo Chicken Pinwheels
- Sausage Cheese Balls
- Bacon Jalapeno Popper Pretzel Bites
- Buffalo Mushroom Bites
- More APPETIZER recipes…
Tools used to make Buffalo Chicken Meatballs with Blue Cheese
Baking dish: I love this baking dish for so many reasons, the main one being that it can go from baking, to serving, to storing with no extra dishes to clean!
Meat Thermometer: having this great tool on hand in your kitchen will help ensure you’re serving sufficiently cooked meats!
*This post originally posted on 02/12/2013.
Ingredients
Buffalo Chicken Meatballs
- 4 tablespoon unsalted butter
- ½ cup Frank's RedHot Hot Sauce
- 1 lb ground chicken
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 celery stalk diced
- 1 egg
- 1 cup plain bread crumbs
Blue Cheese Sauce
- 8 ounces light sour cream
- ½ cup 1% milk
- ½ cup reduced-fat blue cheese crumbles
- ½ cup reduced-fat mayonnaise
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
- Celery sticks for serving
Instructions
Buffalo Chicken Meatballs
- Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. Coat a 9-inch x 13-inch baking dish with non-stick cooking spray.
- To a small pot, add butter and hot sauce on low heat and whisk until butter is melted over medium heat. Set the pot aside to cool for about 10 minutes.
- In a large bowl, combine the ground chicken, salt, celery, egg, bread crumbs, and cooled hot sauce mixture. Mix with your hands until completely combined.
- Roll the buffalo chicken mixture into golfball-sized meatballs, packing the meat firmly. Place balls evenly in rows in your prepared baking dish.
- Bake until the meatballs are firm and cooked through, about 20 minutes. Remove from oven and cool for at least 5 minutes before servings.
Blue Cheese Sauce
- Combine sour cream, milk, blue cheese crumbles, mayo, salt, and red wine vinegar in a bowl and whisk until completely blended.
- If desired, drizzle the meatballs with extra hot sauce. Serve warm or at room temperature with blue cheese sauce for dipping and celery sticks.
Notes
- Nutrition is for 1 meatball with 1 tablespoon of blue cheese sauce.
- Blue cheese sauce recipe makes about 2 1/2 cups.
Nutrition
brianna says
Can these be prepped & frozen ahead of time? I would like to have these for Christmas but would be super helpful if i could make over the weekend & freeze until Christmas.
Miguel Roman says
Wow! They look so appetizing in the picture above. My mouth is watering!
Sue says
Question: what kind of bread crumbs?
STEPHANIE LOTT says
Look Delicous. Where can U Get This At?
Barbara Fedor says
these are delicious. I buy boneless skinless chicken and just put it through my food processor.