Upgrade Cocktail Meatballs With A Simple Glaze Of Sweet Chili Sauce

Cocktail meatballs are one of the best appetizers to prepare for a dinner party — they're tasty and easy to serve with toothpicks, allowing guests to pick up as many as they desire seamlessly. Next time you serve cocktail meatballs, we suggest upgrading this classic appetizer with a sweet chili sauce glaze.

The sweet chili sauce will take the flavors of your meatballs to the next level with its balance of spicy and sweet; they will be much more memorable with a tasty sauce than without. If you need a place to start, refer to Tasting Table's easy sweet chili sauce recipe, which can be whipped up in about 20 minutes. Plus, the garlic in the recipe brings in even more depth of flavor and ties together the sweet-spicy balance. 

While using it as a glaze works wonderfully, you could also keep the sweet chili sauce on the side so guests can decide how much they want on their meatballs. Or, you can make a batch with a glaze and one without to provide variety. However, you may want to make extra batches in case those enjoying the ones with the glaze love the sauce so much they also dip the meatballs in the on-the-side sauce for more of the deliciousness.

The great thing about our sweet chili sauce recipe is that it can be adapted to your — or your guests' — specific tastes. Maybe you're not a spice fan, and you find the "chili" part of the sweet chili sauce to be a bit too much. In that case, reduce the amount of red chili flakes you use. Our recipe calls for 1 teaspoon of red chili flakes, but you can cut it in half. Or, you could even adapt it into a sweet, garlicky sauce by leaving out the red chili flakes entirely. On the other hand, if you want to up the ante on the sweetness, you can add an extra pinch of sugar.

Of course, you could also pick a different type of sauce to pair with cocktail meatballs. Like sweet chili sauce, a homemade sweet and sour sauce also nicely complements the meatballs, either as a glaze or for dipping. You also can't go wrong with a classic cocktail sauce — it's a go-to sauce for appetizers for a reason.