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I have a new obsession.
And that obsession is Thai food.
It all started a few months ago when Seth and I ran in the Spartan Race that I talked a little bit about here, and afterwards went out to eat with his family at a Thai restaurant in Charlotte called Basil. So before eating at this delicious restaurant, I was under the impression that I hated curry with a burning passion.
Which still isn’t completely un-true, but it’s only certain curries that I dislike – pretty much any Indian curry. I am not giving up on loving Indian curry, though! I am hoping that some day I will try one Indian curry dish that I really enjoy and it will go from there.
So anyway, because I have always really disliked Indian curry, I assumed that I wouldn’t like any type of curry.
But while we were at the restaurant in Charlotte, I tried a few different Thai curries that his family ordered aaaaaaaaaaand they were the best things ever.
I would say at this point in my life, Thai red curry is my all time favorite food.
I am definitely planning on making a red curry dish and posting it on The Garlic Diaries, but the delay on that is a super long story that begins with me researching the most authentic curry brands for hours and ends with me accidentally having it shipped to our apartment in Georgia instead of here in Kansas….NOOO. Tears.
So since this revelation of my curry and Thai food LOVE, we have been cooking it a lot more and going out to eat at Thai restaurants pretty often, too.
New obsession with Thai food = birth of these delicious, flavorful, yummy-yummy-yummy lettuce wraps.
The meatballs are bursting with flavor from the garlic, ginger, scallions, fish sauce, lime, and sriracha that are mixed in with the meat, not to mention a spicy/sweet pop from the sweet chili sauce that lightly coats the outside of these scrumptious morsels.
These flavor bomb Thai meatballs are resting on a coleslaw, basil, mint, cilantro, scallion base that is dressed with a creamy, tangy rice vinegar based dressing.
Apologies for the puddle of drool that is now covering your computer/phone/tablet.
P.S. See that pretty wooden spoon that has been featured in two of these pictures so far? We just got a big fat check from our DITY move (when you move yourself in the Army without any help, they pay you – woop!). Most of it went into savings, but we each bought ourselves something nice with a chunk of it. I got these two new fancy shmancy wooden spoons that I could have never excused paying so much for otherwise.
Soooo I’m a little obsessed with them at the moment and will probably include them in any picture containing ingredients that can be stuffed into a spoon :).
I was/am probably too excited about them for normal social behavior.
#foodblognerd
#sorryimnotsorry
#toomanyhashtags?
#spoons!
It’s also photo bombing the bottom left corner of this picture :).
Enjoy, fellow Thai food lovers!
- Author: Annie Chesson
- Prep Time: 30 mins
- Cook Time: 15 mins
- Total Time: 45 mins
- Yield: 5-6 lettuce wraps 1x
Ingredients
Scale
- For the meatballs:
- 1.5 pounds lean ground pork
- 4 scallions, thinly sliced
- 1 tablespoon ginger, finely minced
- 2 cloves garlic, finely minced
- 1 1/2 teaspoons fish sauce
- 1/2 teaspoon sriracha
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons lime juice (1 – 2 limes)
- 1–2 tablespoons sweet chili sauce (for coating the meatballs once they are cooked)
- For the cole slaw:
- 1 14 oz bag cole slaw mix (the kind with regular cabbage, purple cabbage, and carrots)
- 10 basil leaves, rolled up and sliced
- 5 mint leaves, rolled up and sliced
- 3 tablespoons cilantro, chopped
- 1 scallion, finely sliced
- 1/4 cup rice vinegar
- 5 teaspoons light mayonnaise
- 4 teaspoons sweet chili sauce
- 1 head of iceberg lettuce or romaine lettuce (either will work for the lettuce wraps)
- Extra lime for garnish
- Extra cilantro for garnish (optional)
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 400 degrees
- For the meatballs, mix all the ingredients except the sweet chili sauce in a medium bowl with your hands until evenly combined (the pork, scallions, ginger, garlic, fish sauce, sriracha, salt, and lime juice)
- Dampen a paper towel with some vegetable oil (canola or coconut oil works too), and wipe it onto a baking sheet to grease it
- Using about 1 heaping tablespoon of meat mixture each, form meatballs and place them on the baking sheet
- Bake the meatballs for 15 minutes or until they are fully cooked through in the middle, flipping once half way through with a spatula
- Meanwhile, make your coleslaw
- In a medium bow, combine all your coleslaw ingredients (the bag of coleslaw mix, basil, mint, cilantro, and scallions)
- To make your dressing, whisk together the rice vinegar, mayonnaise, and sweet chili sauce in a small bowl and pour over the coleslaw, tossing to coat
- Set aside until the meatballs are finished baking
- When the meatballs are done, transfer them to a bowl and toss with 1-2 tablespoons sweet chili sauce (they should just have a very light coating)
- To assemble, start with a lettuce cup, spoon in a pile of coleslaw, and top with three meatballs
- Top with a little extra cilantro (optional), and an extra squeeze of lime juice (highly recommended!)
- Note: if you don’t want to deal with the lettuce wrap (they can get a bit messy!), just serve the meatballs on a bed of the coleslaw, squeeze a little lime juice on top, and eat with a fork!
*This recipe is gluten free*
If you make this or any of my other recipes, be sure to Instagram it and hashtag #thegarlicdiaries!
Love lettuce wraps? Check this recipe out:
30 Minute Cashew Chicken Lettuce Wraps
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