letscrush

Thursday, April 16, 2009

Old School Spaghetti & Meatballs

We had good ole' spaghetti & meatballs last night...nom, nom, nom! Mike made the marinara sauce and I made the meatballs.....I love Italian affair! This morning I had a free health screening they offer at my work every year and you get paid to do it, and I was wondering how eating all this pasta and meat, in addition to the exorbitant amount of candy I have been indulging in last week would affect the outcome? Oddly enough my glucose, blood pressure, and cholesterol all had good numbers. YAY! I don't need a bad health check to trigger me into a panic attack! And now we begin....... Meatballs 2 lb ground beef (not the real lean stuff) 2 lb ground pork 1 cup wheat bread crumbs 2 eggs big handful of chopped Italian parsley 1 onion 3 garlic cloves salt & pepper to taste ~I sauteed the onions and garlic until slightly brown then added to the rest of the meatball mixture. Put them in the oven uncovered at 450 degrees for 35 minutes. Next time I will flip those suckers midway through so they brown evenly on each side. It's really only for esthetics, they still taste 'da bomb'! Marinara Sauce 2 big cans of tomato puree( don't get generic brand as they usually add cornstarch or other things to stretch it out) or 1 can of puree and one 1 jar of Classico Tomato & Basil sauce ( you really don't need this, but we didn't have time to let the sauce simmer and let all the flavors come out. And Classico doesn't have foreign preservatives in it...just basic ingredients.) 1/2 -1 cup of chicken stock 1/2 - 1 cup red wine( not cooking wine, but any red you would sip on anyway) 1 carrot chopped tiny 2 celery stalks chopped tiny 1 onion chopped handful of fresh chopped basil handful of fresh chopped oregano handful of fresh chopped Italian parsley 2 garlic cloves minced 1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder 1 tbsp dark brown sugar red pepper flakes Siracha hot sauce to taste salt & pepper I think that is everything Mike put in the sauce? Yep...I had him check and that's everything. ~ I garnished with parmigiano and part-skim ricotta.....If you haven't tried ricotta as a condiment, you must! It adds a nice refreshing coolness and authentic Italian eating feel... ~All of this makes enough for like 3 meals for a family of 4. I freeze this with the sauce poured right over the balls.~ CRUSH IT...... ~ Jaime

1 comment:

about crush... said...

I made meatballs recently and yours look way better than mine. I worked mine too much into balls so they were a little on the tough side. Yours look rustic and tasty.