Weekly Dinner Challenge - Eating from the Pantry!

We are heading to Oregon for our yearly family trip to Seaside tomorrow, so I actually haven't done any actual grocery shopping this week other than a few great deals I couldn't pass up and a little fresh produce. I have been inspired by my favorite blog, MoneySavingMom.com; she along with a lot of other bloggers are doing an Eating from the Pantry Challenge the whole month of January! I decided to go along this week but next week we need to go to the store; I am out of almost everything after the holidays!

I did a little research at AllRecipes.com and found THIS great looking recipe for meatballs using things I already had in my pantry! I have never made homemade meatballs before so I thought this would be a good challenge. I did vary from the online recipe, but they ended up turning out GREAT! (Sorry to those of you who don't like meat photos!)

My Variation:
- 1 lb Organic Ground Beef
- 1/2 cup Milk
- 1 Egg (Organic, Cage-free - $2.00 dzn at Fred Meyer this week)
- 1/4 Bread Crumbs, Italian style
- 1 Tbsp Garlic Salt
- 1/4 cup Grated Parmesan Cheese
- 1/2 cup finely chopped Fresh Spinach (Fresh Express Baby Spinach, $1 per bag at Fred Meyer this week.) Can't taste the spinach, 2 year old LOVED them!
- additional Italian seasoning and dried parsley
- I wanted to add some chopped onion but I was out and didn't have any dried either.

Pre-heat oven to 350. Mix together in a bowl and form into balls the size of golf balls; place on cookie sheet. (Tip: Line sheet with aluminum foil, will help with clean-up!) Bake meatballs for approx 30 min. Made about 18 Meatballs.

These taste great all by themselves along with a salad or steamed veggies. I cooked some No Yolk egg noodles and served the meatballs with brown gravy over the noodles along with some green beans on the side. (Sorry forgot to take a meal photo!)

Since I was on a roll with the whole pantry idea, I decided to use up the last of my organic pumpkin puree from Trader Joe's and make a loaf of Pumpkin Pie Bread to take with us for breakfasts down in Seaside this weekend! Yummy!