cooked pasta

This spaghetti and meatballs recipe is everything you'd expect from Dorie Greenspan. It's easy, utterly delicious, and a crowd pleaser. The meatballs take on a unique taste and texture thanks to a couple healthy stealth ingredients.

Dorie Greenspan's Spaghetti and Meatballs

tomatoes

can crushed tomatoes (preferably San Marzano)

garlic (pressed

sugar

balsamic vinegar

fine sea salt

black pepper

beef

hot Italian sausage meat

onion

rolled oats (not instant)

walnuts

herbs

egg (lightly beaten)

olive oil (plus more if needed)

spaghetti

Grated Parmesan or Grana Padano

Crush

Pour the whole tomatoes into a large Dutch oven and use your hands or a pair of kitchen scissors to tear or cut them into bite-size pieces.

Simmer

Add the remaining ingredients and stir to combine. Place the Dutch oven over very low heat, cover, and gently simmer while you make the meatballs.

Make the sauce

In a large bowl, combine the beef, sausage, onion, oats, walnuts, herbs, and salt and pepper and mix gently by hand. Add the lightly beaten egg and work it in just until combined. Using a medium (1 1/2 tablespoon) cookie scoop or your hands, form the mixture into 24 to 28 small meatballs about 1 1/2 inches (4 cm) in diameter. Be careful not to compact the meat too much or your meatballs will be tough.

Brown

In a large skillet set over medium heat, warm the oil. Add half the meatballs and cook, turning occasionally, until they’re browned on all sides, 4 to 5 minutes. (You’re not looking to cook the meatballs through.) Transfer the meatballs to a paper-towel lined plate and pat them lightly with additional paper towels to remove as much oil as possible. Repeat with the remaining meatballs, adding more oil to the skillet if needed.

Place the browned meatballs in the sauce, nudging the meatballs around to make sure that they’re submerged. Cover the pan and cook at the lowest possible simmer, with just an occasional bubble reaching the surface, for 1 to 1 1/2 hours. This long, gentle simmer keeps the meatballs tender and imparts even more flavor to the sauce. (The meatballs and sauce can be made in advance and refrigerated for up to 3 days. Before serving, simmer everything together in a covered pot over low heat for about 30 minutes.)

Make the meatballs

Cook

When the meatballs are almost ready, place a large pot of heavily salted water over high heat and bring to a boil. Add the pasta and cook according to package directions until al dente. Drain the pasta and turn it out into the Dutch oven along with the sauce and meatballs, tossing well to coat. (If your Dutch oven isn’t large enough for this, put the pasta in a large bowl and pour over the meatballs and sauce.)

Serve

Finish with a sprinkle of cheese and herbs, if using, and get this to the table pronto.

Make the spaghetti and serve

Pasta with butter and Parmesan appeals to nearly everyone. This pasta&#39;s brilliance lies in it&#39;s simplicity, universal appeal, and endless add-in options.

Pasta with Butter and Parmesan

unsalted butter

olive oil

garlic (smashed well with the side of a knife)

Salt

spaghetti (or other long pasta,

Parmesan cheese (plus more for serving)

flat-leaf parsley (chopped)

Infuse

Melt the butter and heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Drop in the crushed garlic cloves and let sizzle to infuse the oil, 5 to 7 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat.

Bring a large pot of well-salted water to a boil. Cook the pasta just shy of the time specified on the package. Reserve 1/2 cup of the pasta water.

Drain

Drain the spaghetti and dump it into the skillet with the garlic butter. Return the skillet to medium-high heat.

Stir

Sprinkle in the Parmesan cheese, add some of the reserved pasta water, and cook, stirring continually, until the sauce is smooth and lightly thickened, 3 to 5 minutes. Remove the garlic cloves, if desired.

Stir in the parsley, season with salt and pepper, and serve with the Parmesan on the side.

Great recipe, David! I've been making a version of it for years.

Cheese fiend? 🤣 You're talking to a woman who has seven 2-to-4-pound blocks of assorted varieties, plus eight bags of assorted variety shredded cheese, all of which I have been aging for 3 years in my fridge, which I keep very cold, with high humidity. Throw in six blocks of cream cheese, several tubs of flavored cream cheese, plus all the varieties I have open. May I also join the Cheese Fiend Club? 🤣

My first time making this type of pasta, everyone loved it!  Too easy! Thank you!

This is delicious I made for me and my friends!

This is my all time favorite way to have spaghetti. I also use many different homemade (is there any other way) sauces, and they have all been adjusted and readjusted over the years to be the best they can be... all yummy, one and all. But... how can you beat just plain ol' salty spaghetti and butter, which is all this recipe basically is, allowing that we'll all use more or less garlic, butter, or pepper (which is absent from this recipe, along with an optional squeeze of lemon and a grate or two of fresh Parmesan) to make it our own. There is nothing wrong with keeping it simple.

Delicious, it truly is simply irresistible.

I love this recipe. my dad added a few tweaks like eggs because it made it like Italian spaghetti. it was yum.

I used 5 T butter and added a handful of pine nuts, a little chopped green onions and finely chopped broccoli florets to the butter sauce.  Then mixed with spaghetti noodles and topped with grated mozzarella cheese.  Put in warm oven until cheese melted.  Garnished with fresh chopped cilantro.  Served with garlic bread.  YUM.

Thanks for this, my kid loves it. Didn't realize I had run out of spaghetti sauce so this quick easy recipe was a life saver. Thanks a million.

I loved this pasta recipe. I tweaked it a little by adding Italian spices and some pepper powder. Kids loved it.

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