Meals · Skillet & sheet-pan mains

Swedish meatballs

Name: Swedish meatballs
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 25 min
Total time: 45 min
Yield: 4 servings
Ingredients: 14 oz 90% lean ground beef; 3.5 oz pork beef sausage, or ground pork; 1/2 cup breadcrumbs; 1/4 cup whole milk; 1 egg; 1/2 yellow onions, grated; 1/4 tsp nutmeg; 1 tsp salt; 3 tbsp butter; 3 tbsp all-purpose flour; 2 cups beef broth; 1/2 cup heavy cream; 1 1/2 tsp Dijon mustard; to finish fresh parsley, chopped

Köttbullar the way they are actually made: small tender meatballs in a cream gravy, with lingonberry acid cutting the richness. IKEA's most famous export, from scratch.

Time: 45 min (20 prep + 25 cook)
Servings: 4
Per serving: 516 kcal
Protein: 31 g

Both directions are legitimate — the score measures fullness per calorie, not virtue. Every version is the same dish, rebalanced.

Ingredients

Meatballs

14 oz 90% lean ground beef400 g
3.5 oz pork beef sausage, or ground pork100 g
1/2 cup breadcrumbs40 g
1/4 cup whole milk60 g
1 egg50 g
1/2 yellow onions, grated80 g
1/4 tsp nutmeg1 g
1 tsp salt6 g

Gravy

3 tbsp butter40 g
3 tbsp all-purpose flour25 g
2 cups beef broth480 g
1/2 cup heavy cream120 g
1 1/2 tsp Dijon mustard8 g

to finish fresh parsley, chopped5 g

Every ingredient links to its food page — same data, same score, same formula.

Steps

Soak the breadcrumbs in the milk 5 minutes — the panade is why Swedish meatballs are tender rather than bouncy.
Mix in the meats, egg, grated onion, nutmeg and salt with a light hand and roll small, walnut-sized balls.
Brown them in a little of the butter in batches, turning gently, and set aside.
Rest of the butter, then the flour for a minute; whisk in broth, then cream and mustard. Return the meatballs and simmer 10 minutes. Parsley, and lingonberry or cranberry sauce alongside.

Why nutmeg?

It's the flavour people can't name but notice when it's missing — along with allspice, it's what separates Swedish meatballs from Italian ones. A quarter teaspoon is plenty; more and it tastes of Christmas.

Why this score

moderately filling

No single route carries this one — a moderate amount of protein, volume and fiber.

Three routes to fullness — one is enough

24% of kcal

71% water

2 g/Mcal

What pulls it down

Nothing here converges the way engineered food does — no sugar, no savoury and no alcohol penalty.

How scores work

Computed on the finished dish, not an average of the parts: 2063 kcal goes into the pot, 1415 g of ingredients comes out as ~1200 g of food → 172 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water, and energy density is the score's biggest lever — so we show the math. Full formula here.

Per

Calories: 172
Protein: (24%); 10 g
Fat: (63%); 12 g
Carbohydrates: (13%); 5 g
of which sugar: 1 g
Fiber: <1 g
Sodium: 536 mg

Percentages are the share of calories from each macronutrient.

Computed from the ingredients' USDA data — nothing typed by hand. Every number is traceable, every score recomputable.

More meals

Photo: AI-generated. Nutrition and score are computed from the ingredients with the published formula — this recipe hasn't been kitchen-tested by us yet.