Rustic American Italian Meatball Spaghetti

Preparation time:  20 minutes
Cooking time: 2 hours
Total time: 2 hours 20 minutes
Servings: 4

When it comes to food, I like it delicious but simple. Simple to the point that anyone can replicate and cook it even if they claimed to be the worse cook in the world.

Watching a few cooking shows over the weekend, it bothered me a bit that food has become more of a competition between TV chefs as to whom can come up with the most unusual way of cooking, of all things, a meat ball spaghetti. Have you ever tried cooking your meatballs in a plastic zip bag? Yeah, exactly!

Anyway, let’s go back to the basics shall we?

Ingredients for your meatballs:

1 pound of lean ground beef
1 cup of bread crumbs
1 tbsp of dried parsley
1 tbsp of grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 tsp of ground black pepper
1/8 tsp of garlic powder
1 beaten egg

For your sauce:

3/4 cup of chopped onion
5 cloves of minced garlic
1/4 cup of olive oil
2 (28 ounce) cans whole peeled tomatoes
2 tsp of salt
1 tsp of white sugar
1 bay leaf
1 (6 ounce) can of tomato paste
3/4 tsp of dried basil
1/2 tsp of ground black pepper

How to cook your Rustic American Italian Meatball Spaghetti?

Pasta

For your pasts, bring a large pot of water to a boil (4 quarts of water for each pound of pasta that you want to use).

Put around 1 tbsp of salt in the water, and add a small amount of oil (the purpose of the oil is so that the pasta won’t stick to each other).

To make sure that you don’t overcook your pasta, just follow the recommended cooking time on its packaging.

Once cooked, drain the pasta and set it aside.

Meatballs

Take a large bowl and add in all the ingredients of your meatballs.

Mix them thoroughly and form them into 12 balls.

Set them aside.

Sauce

Over medium heat, saute your garlic and onions in a large sauce pan until the onion becomes translucent.

Then add your bay leaf sugar, salt and tomatoes in the mix.

Cover the pan and let the mixture simmer for 90 minutes in low heat.

You then add your meatballs, ½ tsp pepper, basil and tomato paste into the mix and allow it to simmer for another 30 minutes.

Once done, you have the option to either toss the pasta into the pan, or to just put your pasta on a plate and add in the sauce and meatballs.

Serve and enjoy!