Smoked Barbecue Meatballs
These smoked meatballs are made with barbecue sauce, barbecue seasoning, and the secret ingredient - crushed pork rinds! Once you start smoking meatballs on the pellet grill, you'll never go back to the oven.
Servings: 20 meatballs
Ingredients
- 1 lb 80/20 ground beef
- 1 lb beef, pork, veal blend *See notes
- 1 cup pork rinds finely crushed
- ½ medium onion grated
- 1 egg
- ¼ cup milk
- ¼ cup barbecue sauce plus more for basting
- 3 cloves garlic minced
- 3 tablespoons barbecue seasoning 1 tablespoon for meat mixture, 2 tablespoons for sprinkling on meatballs
Instructions
- Heat pellet grill or smoker to 250℉ with your choice of wood or pellets.
- In a large mixing bowl, mix together the egg, milk, ¼ cup barbecue sauce, minced garlic, and 1 tablespoon barbecue seasoning until well combined. Then mix in the crushed pork rinds, grated onion, ground beef, and ground beef/pork/veal blend. Use your hands or a wooden spoon to incorporate all of the ingredients together. Allow the mixture to sit in the refrigerator for about 15 minutes for all of the ingredients to come together and the pork rinds to soak up some of the moisture.
- While the meatball mixture is resting, oil a wire cooling rack with non-stick cooking spray or a paper towel with a few drops of cooking oil. Set aside.
- Use a cookie scoop or measuring cup to portion out about ¼ cup of the meat mixture, and roll it in the palms of your hands to form a ball. Repeat until all of the meatballs are formed. *You should have 20 meatballs.
- Sprinkle the meatballs with the remaining barbecue seasoning, and transfer to the wire cooling rack, evenly spaced.
- Place the wire cooling rack with the meatballs on the indirect heat side of the grill. Smoke at 250℉ until the internal temperature of the meatballs reaches about 140-145℉ as read by an instant read meat thermometer. *Our meatballs took about 1 hour to reach 145℉ internal temp, but cooking times will vary based on your pellet grill and the size of your meatballs.
- Once the meatballs hit about 145°F internal temp, start basting them with your favorite barbecue sauce. You can use a pastry brush, basting brush, or spoon to glaze the top of each ball. Continue cooking, glazing every 15 minutes, until the meatballs reach an internal temperature of 160°F. *Total smoking time for us was 1 hour and 45 minutes, but cook times will vary.
- Transfer smoked barbecue meatballs to a serving platter. Serve warm.
Notes
- Beef, pork, veal blend - Our recipe calls for one pound of a beef, pork, and veal blend specifically made for meatloaf or meatballs. You should be able to find this in the meat case of most grocery stores labeled as "Meatloaf" or "Meatball" blend. If you can’t find the blend that we used, then you can substitute extra 80/20 ground beef.
- BBQ seasoning and sauce recommendations - We used 'Que That Rub and Seasoning and Blues Hog Champions' Blend barbecue sauce. Both of these options were perfect for this recipe!
- Forming the meatballs - We highly recommend using a quick-release cookie scoop for portioning out the meatball mixture. We used a 2 tablespoons cookie scoop to scoop out two scoops of the meatball mixture – so each ball was roughly 1/4 cup.
- If meatballs stick to wire rack - I did not have a problem with my meatballs sticking to the wire rack, but if you find that yours are difficult to remove from the rack, then use a pair of tongs to gently wiggle each ball until it loosens.