These great tasting Swedish Meatballs are smothered in a rich creamy sauce. Serve them nestled on top of a pile of courgette (zucchini) noodles for a delicious low Point dinner.
If you follow the WW Personal Points plan you can find out how many Personal Points this recipe will be for you & track it directly to your WW App by clicking on the blue button in recipe card below!
If you are still following the Weight Watchers Blue, Purple, Green or old Freestyle plan a generous serving of these Swedish Meatballs will be 6 SmartPoints!
Scroll straight to the recipe, or if you would like some Weight Watchers tips and hints or some tweaks that could reduce the SmartPoints further, read on.
These meatballs are lovely served with noodles, rice or with a serving of creamy mashed potato for an ultimate comfort meal.
If you have ever been to IKEA (and who hasn't) you will probably have seen, or perhaps even eaten, their meatballs covered in a thick creamy sauce.
Well this recipe is a Weight Watchers friendly take on those yummy meatballs.
According to IKEA's nutritional information, their meatballs with cream sauce would set you back 21 Points and that doesn't include the mashed potato!
That would set you back a further 4 Points (depending on the plan you follow)!
So Ikea's meatballs with mashed potato would be more than my daily food allowance - wow!
With this recipe you get between 3 and 4 meatballs per portion (depending on the size of your meatballs) and a good helping of thick and creamy sauce.
Serve with a small serving of creamy mashed potato for a real IKEA experience & for just an extra couple of points!
I've tried this recipe a number of different ways.
I experimented with mixing the onion into the meatballs and also by adding the diced onion to the gravy.
I've tried grating the onion and I've tried dicing the onion ( yes, I've eaten a lot of meatballs over the past couple of weeks).
I prefer this recipe, with diced onions mixed into the meatballs! It makes for a tastier meatball with a creamier gravy!
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What I used to make these Swedish Meatballs:
Use a large nonstick skillet like this one, available from Amazon.
I used this Spiralizer, available from Amazon, to make the courgette noodles that I served with these Swedish Meatballs.
I used Lightest Philadelphia cream cheese in this recipe.
Alternatives:
- You can serve these meatballs with pasta, rice, mashed potato or mashed sweet potatoes for extra Points.
- Serve with zucchini noodles, carrot noodles, spaghetti squash or butternut squash mash for no extra Points.
- Use turkey breast mince and reduce the Points if turkey / chicken is on your zero point list.
- I used Lightest Philadelphia cream cheese in this recipe. If you use Philadelphia light cream cheese this may add additional Points to the whole recipe.
Points in Swedish Meatballs
Click on blue button in the recipe card to find out exactly how many Personal Points these meatballs will be for you! You can even track them straight into your App (you will need to be logged in to your WW App for this to work)!
If you still follow any of the old WW plans then the Points will be as follows:
- myWW Blue plan - 6 SmartPoints per serving
- myWW Green plan - 6 SmartPoints per serving
- myWW Purple plan - 6 SmartPoints per serving
- Freestyle plan - 6 SmartPoints per serving
More WW Meatballs recipes:
Italian Meatballs.
Swedish Meatballs | Weight Watchers
Ingredients
- 2 cups extra lean mince / ground beef (450g)
- 1 small onion finely chopped
- ¼ cup breadcrumbs (25g)
- ¼ tsp ground allspice
- ¼ tsp nutmeg
- ½ tsp garlic powder
- ½ tsp black pepper
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 egg
- 1 tbsp oil
- 1⅔ cup beef stock (400ml) made with one stock cube / bouillon
- 1 tbsp Worcestershire Sauce
- 1 tsp dijon mustard
- 6 tbsp light Philadelphia cheese (100g)
Instructions
- Place the mince/ground beef, onion, breadcrumbs, allspice, nutmeg, garlic powder, pepper, salt and egg in a large bowl. Using clean hands mix until all the ingredients are combined.
- Roll into 16 - 18 small meatballs and set aside.
- Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in a frying pan / skillet and over a medium heat add the meatballs, turning until they are brown all over and are cooked through. Remove from the skillet and place on plate and cover until needed.
- Still with the pan on a medium heat, add a couple of tablespoons or stock to the pan. Use a wooden spoon to de-glaze the pan by scraping all the browned bits from cooking the meat into the liquid so that it melts. Add the Worcestershire sauce, Dijon mustard and the rest of the beef stock and stir.
- Bring to a boil and then reduce the heat and simmer until the sauce has reduced by a half.
- Reduce the heat further to a low heat and stir in the Philadelphia cheese, making sure that it has all melted before adding the cooked meatballs. Stir and cook for a further 5 minutes.
- Serve on courgette / zucchini noodles, or with rice or potatoes or noodles if you have the SmartPoints to do this.
Sue Armstrong says
These meatballs were awesome! Easy and incredibly tasty. Will definitely make them again ????
Marianne says
I am so pleased that you enjoyed them Sue ???? Thank you for your comments!
Deb Jenkins says
No egg listed in the ingredients
Marianne says
Oops! Thanks, corrected
Jo cooper says
Hi there
Can you confirm if this recipie is suitable for freezing please? I would like to batch cook some with turkey mince.
Many thanks
Marianne says
Hi Jo
I have frozen these meatballs before. The only thing I would say is that once or twice I found that the sauce separated a little after freezing. They still tasted great, but the sauce didn't look very pretty. I think that this has something to do with the low fat content of the cream cheese - it doesn't emulsify like cream or full fat cream cheese would!!
If you are bothered about this, you could always make the recipe up to point 5, freeze, then stir in a little Philadelphia when you are reheating them prior to eating.
I hope this helps.
Good luck with your WW journey.
Marianne x
Marcy Szeliga says
These meatballs are AMAZING. I had a friend visiting from out of town for two weeks and I made them for the first time while she was here. We had another friend join us for a weekend, and the first friend begged me to make them again. So I did, a double batch, and they were devoured over the course of a weekend. I will use this recipe to make ALL meatballs from now on (I think it's the nutmeg and allspice, two spices I'm not usually fond of, but I trusted the recioe and followed it to the letter. So glad I did!)
I still struggle with the sauce. Specifically, the cream cheese. While my friend loved how thick and rich it made the sauce, i found it to be a little too heavy and both times, it didn't melt well. There were tiny little polka dots of cream cheese in the sauce both times. The first time, I used generic cream cheese right out of the fridge. The next time, we used brand name cream cheese which had sat out softening all day. The second time, I took my immersion blender to it and that made the tiny lumps go away. Next time, I might go half cream cheese, half lowfat sour cream. Not sure.
Tonight as I sit here "socially distancing" myself, I'm making a triple batch of the meatballs which I will freeze raw in portions to use up in different sauces in these days of self-sequestering. Thanks so much for sharing this delicious and decadent recipe!!
Marianne says
Marcy
Thank you so much for your comments and I am delighted that you enjoyed the Swedish Meatballs so much.
Receiving your comment yesterday really made my day - it's so nice when people take the time to comment - it really is appreciated.
As for the sauce - I have experienced the tiny lumps once or twice when making this recipe (although bizarrely not every time!) I put it down to the fat content (or lack thereof of fat content!) in the cream cheese. I will update this post if I can identify a sure fire way of why it happens and/or of preventing it from happening!
I would be really interested to hear from you how you get on with the sour cream/cream cheese mix.
Best of luck with your WW journey and please keep safe.
Kindest regards
Marianne x
Marcy Szeliga says
Whoops. Forgot to give a star rating. Obviously, five stars!
Mandy says
I made these tonight (a double batch thank goodness) and the whole family loved them. I got lots of compliments! Thanks so much!!
Jo says
So what do I do with the zucchini noodles?… do I heat em up or cook em in some way?
Jo
Jen says
I added a touch of corn starch to thicken the sauce more. Soooo good!
Marianne says
So glad that you enjoyed it Jen.
Best of luck with your WW journey
Kindest regards
Marianne x
Kat J says
Loved this recipe. I had to tweak for what was in the house, like we all do. I used a ratio of 90-10 ground chicken and wagyu combo, it was tasty. Big hit with the husband. Will def make this again.
Thanks for sharing.
Marianne says
Hi Kat
So pleased that you & your husband enjoyed this dish! It's one of my favourites too.
Best of luck with your WW journey
Best wishes
Marianne x
Jocelyn says
This sounds really good! Will be making soon. Thanks so much!
Jane says
My entire family eat the marvelous meatballs, from my 1 year old to my husband and all the ages in between! They don’t even know they are WW. They like them way better than my grandmother’s Italian meatballs. Soooo soooo yummy and easy! I’ve had the dots of cream cheese too. I found if the cream cheese is VERY soft and I whisked it in, they blended much better, but no one seems to care cause they are so delicious. Thanks for a great recipe