I’m bringing back a one pan meal everyone is absolutely obsessed with. It’s seasonal, perfect for summer, and PACKED WITH FLAVOR.
I’d like you to meet my cilantro chicken meatballs simmered in a easy, sweet mango coconut sauce. I’m in love and you will be too.
This recipe all started when I was digging around in my blog archives looking at some of my most popular dinner recipes. Most of them happened to be one pan meals: Mama’s Puerto Rican chicken and rice, Thai-inspired yellow curry chicken and rice and of course my tandoori chicken and rice.
Clearly I’m a one pan meal lover and so are YOU!
Ingredients in these cilantro chicken meatballs
These healthy cilantro chicken meatballs are packed with SO much flavor, herbs and spices that it’s guaranteed to be your new favorite recipe. Here’s what you’ll need to make them:
- For the meatballs: you’ll need lean ground chicken (or turkey), an egg, panko bread crumbs, cilantro, red onion, jalapeño, garlic, ginger, cumin, turmeric, and cayenne pepper.
- For the mango coconut sauce: this creamy sauce is made with a can of light coconut milk, diced mango, and a couple tablespoons of gluten free soy sauce.
- Mix-ins: simmer the meatballs up with red bell pepper and peas for a boost of veggies.
- To garnish: I love topping my plate with chopped honey-roasted peanuts, green onion, fresh cilantro, and some hot sauce.
Easy ingredient swaps
Customize your cilantro chicken meatballs with any of our recommended ingredient swaps:
- Use chicken or turkey. Whether you use ground chicken or ground turkey I recommend using no leaner than 93% so that the meatballs aren’t too dry.
- Make them gluten free. Simply use gluten free breadcrumbs or 2-3 tablespoons of coconut flour to help bind them together.
- Use frozen mango. Just be sure to thaw it first before adding it to the recipe.
- Choose your veggies. Feel free to use any veggies you have on hand! I think this recipe would be delicious with broccoli, edamame, snap peas, or even spinach.
How to cook meatballs in sauce
We can’t deny the real star of this recipe: SWEET MANGO COCONUT SAUCE. After I spotted a juicy, ripe mango on my counter, I knew what was about to go down: a sweet and savory mango coconut sauce for the meatballs to simmer in. Here’s how to cook these cilantro chicken meatballs in the sauce:
- Brown your meatballs. Start by browning the meatballs in a deep pan with oil. No need to cook them all the way through.
- Add the sauce. You’ll then add the mango coconut sauce on top and cover the pan with a lid.
- Simmer & serve. Lastly, you’ll simmer the meatballs for about 20 minutes in the sauce, add your veggies, and simmer for a few minutes more. That’s it!
Make the meatballs ahead of time
These flavorful cilantro chicken meatballs can easily be prepped ahead of time!
- Mix and form the meatballs as directed in the recipe.
- Place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, and then tightly cover the meatballs with plastic wrap.
- Put the meatballs in the fridge until you are ready to cook them. You can prep these meatballs up to one, or even two days ahead of time.
- Once ready to cook, simply follow the recipe as written.
Our favorite ways to serve these cilantro chicken meatballs
While the meatballs & veggies are delicious on their own, they’re even more amazing with a grain or noodle to soak up that delicious sauce. Here’s what we recommend:
- My go-to coconut rice or green rice
- Brown rice
- Forbidden rice (aka black rice)
- Quinoa
- Rice noodles, sweet potato noodles, or zucchini noodles
- My coconut cauliflower rice
Two amazing ways to freeze meatballs
- Cook first, then freeze: simply place your meatballs and mango coconut sauce in a freezer-safe, airtight container or bag and freeze it all for up to 3 months. When you’re ready to enjoy, let your container of meatballs + sauce thaw in the refrigerator for a few hours or overnight, and then empty the contents into a pan on the stovetop. Heat them in your pan until they’re nice and warm, and then serve!
- Freeze before cooking: you can also freeze these meatballs before cooking them! Form your meatballs as instructed, place them on a baking sheet, and put them in the freezer for 1-2 hours. This is called a flash freeze. Then, transfer your frozen meatballs to an airtight, freezer-friendly bag or container and place in the freezer for up to 3 months. To thaw them, simply place them in the refrigerator for a few hours or overnight and then cook them in the mango coconut sauce as directed in the recipe.
More healthy one pan meals to try
- One Pan Sazon Skillet Chicken
- One Pan Ginger Chicken Meatballs with Peanut Sauce
- One Pan Caribbean Jerk Chicken with Pineapple-Coconut Rice
- One Pan Thai Coconut Yellow Curry Chicken & Rice
- Sheet Pan Zucchini Chicken Meatballs with Coconut Curry Sauce
Get all of our delicious one pan meals here!
If you make these cilantro chicken meatballs, be sure to leave a comment below and rate the recipe below! You can also snap and picture and post it on Instagram using the hashtag #ambitiouskitchen. xo!
Cilantro Chicken Meatballs in Mango Coconut Sauce
Ingredients
- For the meatballs:
- 1 pound 93% lean ground chicken (or lean ground turkey)
- 1 egg
- ½ cup panko breadcrumbs (or if GF sub 2-3 tablespoons coconut flour)
- ⅓ cup finely diced cilantro
- ¼ cup finely diced red onion
- 1 jalapeño, seeded and finely diced
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- ½ tablespoon freshly grated ginger (or ½ teaspoon ground ginger)
- ½ teaspoon ground cumin
- ½ teaspoon turmeric
- ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- ½ teaspoon salt
- Freshly ground black pepper
- 1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil (can also use avocado oil or coconut oil)
- For the coconut mango sauce:
- 1 (15 ounce) can light coconut milk
- 1 ½ cup diced mango (can use frozen, just make sure you thaw it first)
- 2 tablespoons gluten free soy sauce (or coconut aminos)
- Add-ins:
- 1 red bell pepper, julienned
- ¾ cup frozen peas (or edamame)
- To garnish:
- Chopped honey roasted peanuts
- Diced green onion
- Fresh cilantro
- Hot sauce, if desired
Instructions
- First, make your mango coconut sauce. Add coconut milk, diced mango, and soy sauce to a blender and blend until smooth. Set aside.
- Next, form your meatballs. In a large bowl, add the ground chicken, egg, breadcrumbs, cilantro, red onion, jalapeño, garlic, ginger, cumin, turmeric, cayenne, salt and pepper. Use clean hands to mix and form into 16 golf ball sized meatballs.
- Place a large deep skillet over medium-high heat and add in sesame oil. Add the meatballs and brown on all sides, about 5-6 minutes total. You may need to do this in batches, depending on how many meatballs you can fit in your skillet without overcrowding them.
- Reduce the heat to medium-low and add your mango coconut sauce to the pan with the meatballs. Cover the pan, reduce heat to low, and simmer for 20 minutes.
- After 20 minutes, remove lid and gently stir in the peas and red bell pepper. Simmer for 5 more minutes uncovered.
- Serve with brown rice, quinoa or with spiralized zucchini or sweet potato. There will be lots of sauce, which makes it delicious! Garnish with chopped honey-roasted peanuts, scallions, cilantro, and top with hot sauce if desired. Serves 4
Recipe Notes
Nutrition
Recipe by: Monique Volz of Ambitious Kitchen | Photography by: Eat Love Eats
This post was originally published on June 10th, 2019, republished on July 7th, 2022, and republished on June 13th, 2024.
Really good. Would love to make it again. Unlikely I’ll ever find this website again. I only save to Pinterest. Why no Pinterest option?
So glad you enjoyed! You’ll find a Pinterest icon on the left side of the screen, and a Pin with a button on the right sidebar (if you’re on a computer).
I made this tonight after finding the recipe on a whim. I searched for ground chicken and cilantro. I used 2T of coconut flour and 1T GF panko. They formed beautifully. I’m sorry I didn’t take a picture!! My two guys enjoyed it with me! Because I used chicken breast they weren’t as moist as they could have been, but they were delicious!
Amazing! So happy these were a hit!
Hi! Do you think it would work to brown the meatballs and then add to a slow cooker with the sauce and cook on low for a few hours?
I think that should work, I’m just not 100% sure if the texture of the sauce will change in the slow cooker!
Tried this yesterday and I liked how it tasted. Some of the things I changed are the following: First, I didn’t have jalapeño and coconut flour. So I just used egg for the meatballs and they still kept their round shape after forming. I was feeling skeptic with the mango coconut sauce since I have never tried it before. But let me tell you… this was really good! The sauce didn’t taste mango at all but it had more of a curry taste because of the spices. To add, I didn’t use light coconut milk, only full fat coconut milk. I think the thickness of the sauce with full fat coconut milk was just right. I used gluten free soy sauce too. I had no red bell peppers and only peas. Paired this with fried rice 🙂 Thank you for the nic recipe!
Amazing! So glad you gave this one a try 🙂 one of our favorite dinners!
Absolutely loved this dish it will be a regular from now on the dinner menu
So happy to hear that!
Really yummy! Not going to lie I was skeptical when I started making the sauce in the blender cold didn’t do it justice but it turned out really good, and everyone enjoyed it! I didn’t have cilantro so that I’m sure would make it even better.
The sauce sounds a bit “odd” but ends up so delicious! Glad you enjoyed 🙂
These are so flavorful and juicy! A quick meal to make too. I love the sauce! I served over cauliflower rice and they were phenomenal!
So happy to hear that!
SO delicious and flavorful. Used ground Turkey and frozen mango. 10/10 will make again!
the sauce is super gross.
Sorry to hear you didn’t like it! Was it the texture for you? Flavor?
Made this as written except for reducing the cayenne by half for the kiddos. Honestly, this was just kind of “meh” for us. I expected a punch of flavor given all the fantastic ingredients, but I ended up with something pleasant but milder and more boring than anticipated. In theory this is delicious, but it wasn’t really a hit with anyone. Don’t think we’ll be making it again.
Sorry to hear that it wasn’t a hit! The ingredients should all be very pronounced in here. You may want to add another pinch of salt to bring out all of the flavors.
These meatballs the Bomb – full of flavour!
So good! Glad you enjoyed 🙂
Must make if you’re a cilantro lover
Agreed!!
This is one of our favorite, easy go to weeknight meals!
I love this recipe so much, it is my favorite meatball dish of all times 😍
Glad you loved it!
This meal was delicious. I love AK recipes for the unique flavors that are consistently great. The sauce was as good as promised, and the meatballs weren’t so flavorful and had a great amount of moisture. I used some diced red onion I had leftover from another recipe that wasn’t finely diced, and the meatballs still held together nicely. I’ll definitely make this again. It’s a new AK fave!
Yay! So glad you’re a fan ❤️
Made this tonight for dinner and unfortunately, the sauce was very bland. It was better after adding some fish sauce, garlic and maple syrup. will not be making this one again.
Sorry to hear that! I’ve always found it to be the perfect sweet & salty combo to pair with the flavorful meatballs. I’m glad the extra add-ins helped out.
What a great flavor profile! When I tried the sauce on its own I wasn’t sure what to expect, but it is absolutely fabulous with the flavor of the meatballs and veggies. I realized too late that I didn’t have a jalapeno so just made it without and the meatballs were still delicious. The only other change I made was to use coconut flour instead of panko breadcrumbs to keep it gluten free. That has worked for me in your other recipes but this time the meatballs were almost too soft to stay together, I think the sheer difference in volume (half cup breadcrumbs vs. 3 tbsp coconut flour) is the reason it didn’t work great for this recipe, so I’ll try using actual GF breadcrumbs next time. For the base of the bowl, I made coconut forbidden rice based on your Thai-Inspired Peanut Chicken with Sticky Coconut Purple Rice, and it was incredible with the mango sauce!
So happy you loved them! And thanks for the note about the coconut flour. Good idea to try GF breadcrumbs next time! And such a great idea to use that coconut rice 😍
If I could give this 10 stars, I would! Great depth of flavor and goes together easily. It’s definitely going to be a regular menu item at our house. I have fixed it with lite coconut milk and with full fat coconut milk, and really didn’t notice any difference, so I would say use whichever one you have on hand.
SO happy you love it!! Thanks so much for the review, Mary 🙂