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Healthy Asian Chicken Meatballs are made with ground chicken, ginger, and spices and coated with a honey-soy sauce. An easy weeknight dinner!
Asian Chicken Meatballs
If you need some easy dinner ideas, you’ll love these Asian Chicken Meatballs. I like to roast broccoli alongside them in another sheet pan and serve them over rice. This meal comes together quickly with minimal effort, making it perfect for busy weeknights. Plus, it’s great for meal prep, and I love the leftovers for lunch. If you enjoy these and want to try a similar recipe in the air fryer, make sure to try my turkey Air Fryer Asian Meatballs.
Why You’ll Love This Asian Chicken Meatballs Recipe
- Fast and Simple: The meatballs bake in under 15 minutes, and the sauce only takes a few minutes to whip up.
- Meal Prep-Friendly: Double the recipe and freeze half for quick dinners in the future. You don’t even have to thaw them first–you can microwave them straight from the freezer.
- Dietary Restrictions: Weight Watchers-friendly, gluten-free (if using GF panko and tamari), high-protein, dairy-free
If you make this healthy Asian chicken meatball recipe, I would love to see it. Tag me in your photos or videos on Instagram, TikTok, or Facebook!
Asian Chicken Meatballs Ingredients
The meatballs and sauce share 4 of the same ingredients, making this recipe simple to prepare without needing a long list of extras. See the recipe card for the exact measurements.
- Ground Chicken: Use 93% lean ground chicken for all the protein with less fat.
- Aromatics: Minced garlic, ginger, and scallions enhance the meatballs’ taste.
- Red Pepper Flakes for some heat
- Low-Sodium Soy Sauce adds umami flavor and salt.
- Sesame Oil provides a rich, nutty depth.
- Egg and Panko bind the ingredients together so the meatballs don’t fall apart.
- Sauce: Toss the meatballs in this spicy, salty, sweet sauce made from soy sauce, cornstarch, honey, sriracha, garlic, ginger, and sesame oil.
- Garnish the dish with sesame seeds and scallions.
How to Make Asian Chicken Meatballs
Here’s how to make this easy Asian chicken meatball recipe. The printable instructions are in the recipe card below.
- Make the Meatballs: Combine all the meatball ingredients in a medium bowl, being careful not to overmix. Shape the mixture into 16 meatballs.
- Bake the Meatballs: Place them on a sheet pan lined with parchment and bake at 400°F for 12 to 15 minutes.
- Make the Sauce: Whisk all the sauce ingredients in a small bowl, then pour into a skillet on low heat. Whisk the sauce until it begins to boil, and then cook for 30 to 60 seconds until it thickens.
- How to Serve the Meatballs: Toss them in the sauce and garnish with scallions and sesame seeds.
Air Fryer Method
If you prefer to use your air fryer, air fry them at 400F for 8-10 minutes, turning halfway.
Variations
- Meat: Substitute lean ground turkey or pork.
- Spice adverse? Omit the red pepper flakes and sriracha.
- Panko: Use regular breadcrumbs.
- Gluten-free Asian Meatballs: Swap soy sauce with tamari and use gluten-free panko.
- Sweetener: Replace honey with maple syrup.
- Air Fry Meatballs at 400°F for 8 to 10 minutes, turning halfway.
What to Serve with Asian Chicken Meatballs
- Serve these spicy Asian meatballs with rice or noodles, such as udon, vermicelli, or rice noodles.
- Roast broccoli on a separate sheet pan to pair with it, or make this bok choy stir fry or Spicy Garlic Edamame.
- Keep it low-carb by eating them over zucchini noodles or fried cauliflower rice or adding them to a salad topped with Asian Carrot Ginger Dressing.
Storage
- Refrigerate for 4 days.
- How to Meal Prep Meatballs: Double the recipe and flash freeze the cooked meatballs on a parchment-lined sheet pan so they don’t stick together. Then, transfer to a zip-locked bag.
- Freeze for 3 months.
- Thaw in the fridge overnight before reheating, or microwave/air fry them straight from the freezer.
More Meatball Recipes You’ll Love
- Korean-Inspired Turkey Gochujang Meatballs
- Italian Turkey Meatballs
- Slow Cooker Beef Meatballs
- Honey-Lime Meatballs (Slow Cooker)
- Mediterranean Meatballs
Asian Chicken Meatballs
Healthy Asian Chicken Meatballs are made with ground chicken, fresh ginger, and spices and coated with a honey-soy sauce.
Yield: servings
Serving Size: 4 meatballs
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 pound 93/7 ground chicken
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 teaspoon fresh ginger, minced
- ¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes
- ½ tablespoon low sodium soy sauce, or gluten-free tamari
- 1 teaspoon sesame oil
- 3 scallions, finely chopped
- 1 large egg
- ⅓ cup panko, plain or gluten-free
Sauce:
- ¼ cup low sodium soy sauce, or gluten-free tamari
- 1 teaspoon corn starch
- 1 tablespoon honey
- 1 teaspoon sriracha hot sauce
- 1 clove fresh garlic, minced
- 1 teaspoon fresh ginger
- 1 teaspoon sesame oil
- sesame seeds and fresh scallions, for garnish
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400°F, and adjust the oven rack to the middle position. Line a large, rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
- Place all of the meatball ingredients in a medium bowl. Use your hands to combine them well, but no need to over-mix. Shape the mixture into approximately 16 meatballs.
- Arrange the meatballs on the prepared baking sheet. Bake them until they are cooked through, about 12 to 15 minutes.
- When the meatballs are done, prepare the sauce. Combine all the sauce ingredients in a small bowl and whisk well. Pour the sauce into a large skillet over low heat, whisking until it begins to boil, then cook 30 to 60 seconds, until the sauce thickens.
- Turn the heat off immediately and gently toss in the meatballs and coat well.
- Top off with fresh scallions and sesame seeds. Enjoy immediately.
Last Step:
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If you prefer to use your air fryer, air fry them at 400F for 8-10 minutes, turning halfway.
Nutrition
Serving: 4 meatballs, Calories: 246 kcal, Carbohydrates: 12 g, Protein: 26.5 g, Fat: 10.5 g, Saturated Fat: 3 g, Cholesterol: 132.5 mg, Sodium: 856.5 mg, Fiber: 0.5 g, Sugar: 4 g
I didnt have Panko, so I subbed in 1/3 c parmesean cheese & 1/3 c almond flour. I dropped them by rounded spoonfuls onto the cookie sheet, & generally followed the rest of the directions. (I’m an eyeballer, not a measurer) i cooked them for 20min because I’m also paranoid. They are DELICIOUS!! 🤩
So delish!! Gina’s recipes rarely miss and this was no exception. I believe this was my first time using ground chicken and I’m so pleasantly surprised. Served with brown rice and steamed broccoli.
Glad you enjoyed it!
The meatballs were delicious and so easy to make. I plan to make a big batch and freeze them for an easy dinner.
This is one of the easiest and best tasting chicken recipes on your site. I love it and make it fairly often. Even doubling the sauce ingredients there’s barely enough, so to others reading comments, if you want a decent amount of sauce for rice, noodles, etc you might triple or even quadruple the ingredients. Double sauce ingredients is about right for me because I don’t want a lot of sauce, just enough for the chicken and a tiny drizzle for rice or noodles.
This is really a very good recipe, though, and I recommend it to others.
By the way, it works with just about any ground meat or tofu, and the sauce recipe alone is nice to make and keep in the fridge for a couple of days for other uses.
Delicious! As others said, I doubled the sauce. I warmed the sauce and put the cooked meatballs into the sauce for a few minutes before serving. Definitely a keeper recipe!
Absolutely delicious, full of flavor. I served over jasmine rice.
Wonderful!
I haven’t made this yet, but could 93/7 ground turkey be substituted for the ground chicken?
really good but you need to double to sauce to survive and make this dish work. Even when I did that, there was almost no sauce to add to the dish. Just saying 🙂
I’ve made these Asian chicken meatballs multiple times, and they never disappoint. The meatballs come out tender and juicy every time, and both the meatballs and the sauce are packed with flavor. Even my picky child—who normally doesn’t like chicken—devours them without hesitation. They’re perfect for a quick dinner and equally great for meal prep lunches because they reheat beautifully. This recipe is absolutely a keeper.
Thanks Angie!
My husband is fairly picky. He loved these! They are on the menu again foe this week.
So good! I don’t love sriracha so didn’t include.
Really enjoyed this recipe! Ground chicken is half the price of ground beef right now so it’s also thrifty! We will be making this again soon.
This was such a delicious meal. I made this for the 1st time tonight, and we all loved it. It was spicy with such a nice flavor, but not too spicy. The meatballs were very tender and were delicious with rice. The only substitution I made was that I had to use powdered ginger since the store was out of fresh ginger. This is definitely getting added into our meal rotation.
The family all liked this one!
Fabulous!!!
Delicious and easy!
I forgot to mention in my other review of this that I did not use the Sriracha because my husband does not like things hot. I did not miss it.
I made these as written, but made another 1.5 amount of the sauce. We loved this. It was a bit salty even though I used the low-salt soy. I am not sure how to reduce this, but maybe using some water with it. I actually made the sauce a bit too thick, so I will watch it carefully next time. It thickened very quickly. I am going to make the meatball mixture and freeze it so I have some ready. They were outstanding and not as dry as I remember another chicken meatball recipe I tried from another site. We had it with brown rice. It was a nice change of pace.
If you swap out the soy sauce for coconut aminos instead it will mellow out the salt. You’ll still get the same soy sauce vibe with no added salt.
Followed the recipe and really enjoyed.
The meatballs were great, but the sauce was very, very salty. I’ll try again but will use less soy (already using reduced sodium).
So easy and really delicious. This is the first time chicken meatballs haven’t been on the dry side and disappointing. Thank you!
Good meatballs but the sauce was very salty. And, yes I used reduce sodium soy sauce. May try adding a bit of brown sugar next time to help counteract the salt.
I’m glad I read the reviews about the salty sauce. I halved the soy sauce and thought it was perfect.
I loved the sauce! Will double it next time to drizzle on rice. Served with rice and roasted green beans
I made these tonight. They are delicious. I roasted some stir fry vegetables along with them. This will be added to my go to recipes
Delicious! I absolutely loved the sauce and the meatballs weren’t dry at all. More recipes like these please!
This is a favorite in our house. I always double the sauce to have a little more to mix with the jasmine rice I make to accompany this. Delicious!
Love this!!! Very flavorful and pretty easy to make. I will have to make double the recipe for left overs because my husband devoured them and we had no left overs between the four of us.
Love this!!! Very flavorful and pretty easy.
Easy and delicious! Great flavor, came together so quickly. Love it!
I wanted to love this recipe so bad, but there were issues. I attempted to make exactly as written, but I had to use an additional 1/2 cup of panko to make them into very soft balls. I used low sodium soy sauce but it was still very salty for everyone’s taste. I made 20 meatballs and I still kept the meatballs in the oven for an additional 8 mins to make sure they were cooked through. I served over basmati rice. Might try again with adjustments to the sauce.
Just made this today (meal prep Monday, except on a Tuesday!). It’s tasty! I thought the meatballs themselves needed a little bit of additional flavor (maybe even a touch of salt), but maybe also because my store only had 99% fat free (not 93%) chicken, so maybe it was lower in flavor. Also I had to use garlic powder because my fresh garlic had rotted. The sauce added nice flavor but, ironically, was a little saltier than I needed — I’d put lots more fresh ginger and more honey next time. But I think there’ll be a next time!
I cooked this tonight for my husband and myself, exactly as described. We both loved it, and best of all there were leftovers for another dinner. I follow Weight Watchers, and at 3 points, this is a keeper. At first I thought there wouldn’t be enough glaze, but after heating and thickening it in a nonstick frying pan, it covered the meatballs just enough to give a nice glaze.
This was soooo good! The whole family loved it.
My son picked this out. It was so good!! I felt proud of myself that it actually turned out amazing. I used ginger, onion, and garlic powder. That’s all I had on hand and it was still tasty. I added a bit more honey to the sauce, we like it sweeter. Over all no complaints!
These are so good! Even my 2 year old loves them
Awesome!
Delicious! The whole family enjoyed them.
Loved this recipe. It was easy to put together and the flavors were great.
Absolutely delicious! At first, they were too soft and wouldn’t form. I added 1/2 cup of extra panko and that fixed it. Then for the sauce, I felt like there wasn’t enough so next time I will add extra.
This recipe is wonderful, very flavorful and easy to put together, less than 45 minutes and dinner was on the table, this will go into the rotation!!
Simple & delicious as usual! Tonight I made them and served over a mix of riced cauliflower & jasmine rice, and some miso soup. Left overs will be with edamame & rice.
Fire!
So good but meatballs do not get to temperature in 15 minutes. We have a new oven and had to turn the air fryer on to get them done. Still took 40 minutes…
I made these last week and loved the taste of the meatballs, but the sauce was way too salty. Maybe I overcooked the sauce? Not sure why it was so salty, I did use low sodium soy sauce.
Served over jasmine rice.
Love all your recipes, will try again.
Such an easy recipe for a week day dinner. Loved the flavors. Hubby requests doubling the sauce next time, he loved it!
Loved the flavors!
My husband and I loved! Served to my 2 y/o and 8 month old without sauce and they ate it all. Biggest compliment!
Awesome!!
This was amazing!
So easy to make and the taste was spot on
Served over jasmine rice
Great recipe, 4 stars because the meatballs do not brown in that cooking time given,
. Will try the top rack next time. Also, needed some zip, so served with lime wedges on the side. Agree with other reviewers about doubling the sauce. I had some Thai chili sauce on hand,so offered that as an addition, served with quinoa.
Served these with broccoli and rice and we thoroughly enjoyed it. Appreciate that when I’m on the go with zero idea of what to cook I can always rely on you to provide recipes that are healthy but extremely flavorful as well. Thank you!!!
Really like ground chicken and even used 99 percent ft free with good success, thought meatball itself was flavorful. I thought like a couple reviews that sauce was a bit salty–even with low sodium soy sauce, but I seem sensitive to anything the least bit salty. Husband thought fine but he would have liked sauce to be a bit thinner….Had Millet for a change of pace grain, some edamame and roasted Brussels as is what I had I wanted to use.
Served with oven baked broccoli and fried rice. Very delicious 😋
Very delicious! I swapped the chicken with ground turkey.
Sooo good!
Made this yesterday. Tripled the recipe (hubs eats a lot of protein). It was amazing! Served with rice and roasted broccoli. Well worth the time it took to roll all the meatballs. We love your recipes!
Thanks Amy!
Easy and delicious. Will definitely make again. Thank you
How big should these meatballs be?
Oh boy… we only had coconut aminos so I used it in place of the soy sauce. So salty it was inedible 😖. Will try again and use lower sodium soy and possibly cut it with water.
This one will be going in the rotation. We loved it. I highly recommend doubling the recipe for some of my family 4 meatballs were just not enough. Especially if you want any leftovers!!
I made these meatballs tonight & thought they were good! I used turkey instead of chicken. Next time, I’ll double the sauce portion so I’ll have more to drizzle over the steamed brocolli I served on the side.
The flavor on these meatballs and sauce was amazing! We served it as recommended with rice and broccoli on the side, and agreed that next time we would make extra sauce, and toss the broccoli and rice with the sauce in the wok, and add the sauced meatballs in at the end. Super easy, quick and delicious weeknight meal!
Just made this tonight for dinner. Another winner! Followed exact steps too.
Thank you Gina!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Delicious and got rave reviews! Thank you!
This was very tasty. I would double the sauce next time if my points allowed for it!
I made this exactly by the recipe and it was amazing! I love how much protein you get and it was even better the next day on cauliflower rice.
Great tasting! Made as per recipe and we enjoyed them. I thought the balls may have been too wet however they baked up fine by 15min mark. Your recipe is a keeper, thank you!!
They were ok, but I wish there was something to make them less dry, perhaps the ground chicken was too lean? The sauce brought some flavor but not enough to make up for bland and dry meatballs. We won’t make again
A hack I learned from a chef: When using lean meats, add onions to add back moisture. Fat is usually what helps keep meat from being dry (which is one reason meat is dried out when overcooked).
Did you use ground chicken breast? I don’t recommend it, its too lean.
Amazing!!!
This was sooooo good ! I absolutely loved them. I did the recipe as written !!
I loved this recipe I used lean hamburger meat it was so good my family ate it up. It had a tad to much ginger for me but that’s just a personal preference
I made this last night following the recipe pretty close. I thought the meatballs themselves were missing something, maybe a little salt. They were much better with the sauce, and better today after the flavors had a chance to meld. Next time, I think I will experiment a little, maybe add some ground flaxseed to add a little nutty flavor.
Great, easy recipe! Lots of flavor! Definitely a keeper!
❤️ ! Definitely double the sauce so you have some for the rice
Délicieux 😋
Thanks for the Recipe
Fantastic! Will double next time so that there are leftovers. Left out the white part of the onion and garlic bc I don’t tolerate either, but was still very flavorful.
So glad there is someone else on here with the onion/garlic intolerance! Good to know when recipes are tried without those ingredients, or with a few adjustments, and still work!
Outstanding recipe. Whole family loved it!
Simple and delicious..
I made this tonight and it was delicious. I doubled the recipe and used half chicken half turkey but otherwise follow the recipe exactly. The meatballs were moist and extremely flavorful! I will definitely be making this again. Thank you for a great recipe!
Very flavorful meal. It was easy to prepare. I will definitely make this recipe again!
Made these tonight and they were amazing!! My whole family loved them. Are they in one of your cookbooks? If so, which one?
Perfection! The whole family loved it, so I am grateful I doubled the recipe:)
Glad everyone enjoyed it!
Super easy and really tasty! I accidentally forgot the egg and they still came out moist and delicious (but I think the lack of mass caused me to have only 15 meatballs lol!) Definitely bookmarking to make again soon.
Why no Weight Watcher point on this recipe?
Points are 3.
Made this last night and even my very picky husband agreed – the flavours are wonderful and these were very juicy. This was very easy to make and came together quickly. I had to sub ground turkey and suspect that, as written, ground chicken would have been better; I will definitely make these again with ground chicken.
The only thing I would say is that a more approximate measurement for the actual size of meatballs would be helpful. I found myself making and remaking the meatballs to get to the 16 number referenced in the recipe. Outside of that, this is a winner for sure!
Hi there. Just a little hint for making meatballs and wanting to come up with 16 meatballs all similar in size: pinch apart the big ball of meat into 16 “clumps” before rolling them into meatballs. It will help you visualize that you’ve got the right amount of meat for each meatball before you form them. You can make adjustments to your portions easier at this phase. hope this helps!
What can I substitute for all the hot spices in the recipe if I don’t want hot spicy?
I would just omit the red pepper flakes and sriracha sauce. I don’t think they need a replacement. That’s what I plan to do!
If you read all the instructions you’ll see Gina tells you how to make the recipe less spicy. Much appreciated.
What brand of ground chicken do you use? I can’t find 93/7% ground chicken. Thanks.
The meat mixture was very wet and pretty much impossible to make meatballs out of. I added some extra ground chicken and Panko to thicken it up. They still were hard to make. I ended up just kind of doing clumps . they tasted fine. Just wondering if there’s something I’m missing?
I wet my hands, it prevents them from sticking to your hands.
What can I use in place of sesame oil? And we are using ginger for the meatballs and the sauce?
The measurement for the siracha sauce is missing
Just fixed!
Sriracha is measured with your heart