Healthy Moroccan Meatballs recipe – a slow cooker meatballs dish

A blogger friend of mine Kerry always makes some tasty looking food so when she offered to share a Moroccan Meatballs recipe with you guys I knew instantly that I just had to share it! It is an easy slow cooker meatballs dish all the family can enjoy.

Slow Cooker Meatballs Tips

Before you start to think about recipes with your slow cooker here are a few tips which may help. If you find your meal is a bit watery take the lid off the slow cooker and turn it up high for half an hour this can help evaporate some of the water.

Using Slow cooker liners can save washing up if you are making something that often sticks.

Remember that nothing evaporates so you may need less liquid than in other recipes eg on the hob.

Get the best size slow cooker for your family there are lots of great ones on Amazon with many under £30 for a good brand and good size!

Disclaimer: Just Average Jen is not connected with any weight loss plan. Please check nutritional values and/or syns yourself.

Making the Moroccan meatballs for weight loss

If you follow Slimming World, Weight Watchers (WW), Noom or any other weight loss plan this is a great recipe to try.

It is of course important to check yourself for any plan you follow and remember all nutritional information and ingredients are found in the recipe card below.

Moroccan meatballs on Slimming World

If you follow Slimming World then you will be able to see some of the ingredients in these are syns. Here I will break down those for you and give you some tips to reduce them.

Syns in lamb mince

Lamb mince with 5% fat is usually syn free like 5% fat beef mince, but really hard to find. This is because lamb is fatty meat and as such even with visible fat removed has a lot of fat in it.

If you can get 10% fat lamb then it is around 1-2 syns for 100g. The Slimming World app currently has the Tesco chilled version as 1 syn per 100g but the Sainsbury chilled one at 2 syns per 100g.

I have no idea why and in all honesty I think sometimes it makes very little sense but there you go.

If you go for 15% fat lamb mince which as far as I can see is only available from Aldi then it is 3 syns per 100g (approx).

Most lamb mince you will find is 20% fat, the syns in this again vary a little depending on the brand, Waitrose, Marks and Spencer and Tesco are 5 syns per 100g (approx), Morrisons (frozen), Ocado 5.5 syns per 100g yet the website also states that standard lamb mince of 20% fat is 4.5 syns (approx).

The Aldi 23% fat lamb mince is listed as 6.5 syns per 100g (approx). On this basis, I will let you decide how to syn it!

Check out my mince recipes for more information on using mince on Slimming World and other mince ideas including Italian meatball soup and spaghetti and meatballs.

Syns in other ingredients

Dried apricots are synned and the amount of syns in them varies a little on brand again but for the total apricots in this recipe, you are looking at around 9-11 syns.

Syns in honey

The one tbsp of honey in this recipe is 2.5 syns (approx).

Syns in sultanas

Sultanas are approx 3.5-4 syns per 25g, and 4.5 syns for 30g (approx) so again syn this as you feel comfortable.

Working the syns out for yourself and your weight loss in the best way possible

Budget tips for your slow cooker meatballs

I try to ensure all of the recipes I make are accessible to everyone. By this, I mean that they do not use obscure hard-to-find ingredients.

I also believe that recipes should use as few ingredients as possible and avoid expensive ingredients. We would all much rather spend money on holidays than expensive ingredients wouldn’t we?

Buying herbs and spices in bulk for recipes like this one for Moroccan Meatballs is something I really recommend. It can save a lot of money in the long term but also mean you never run out! I find putting them on Amazon subscribe and save helps too!

Shopping around to see which shops have offers on your usual products can make a big difference to your weekly shopping bill. Additionally don’t forget to check out the yellow sticker reductions and freeze what you can.

Frozen vegetables are nutritionally just as good as fresh usually so do keep an eye for those too to save money. Do you have any particular frozen vegetables you love? Do share them with me it is always nice to hear people’s recommendations.

More healthy recipes you may enjoy

For more recipes like this slow cooker meatballs recipe that use mince check out my mince recipe guide.

Do you like to use your slow cooker? If you enjoyed this Moroccan meatballs recipe then have you tried all my slow cooker recipes?

Which meal do you struggle with ideas for in your diet? I have lists of breakfast ideas and lunch ideas if that helps you.

A little bit about Kerry who shared this recipe

Hi, I’m Kerry, mum to 2 beautiful children and step mum to 1. I am a part-time small animal vet and have a family lifestyle blog, with a focus on crafts, called Blissful Domestication.

We love cooking, gardening, crafting and going on family adventures! I am passionate about encouraging creativity and imagination in others, especially children and hope my blog serves as a source of ideas and inspiration for other like-minded mums to inject a little creativity into their family life.

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