New Meatball Recipe and Ways to Eat Them

The last time I made meatballs, they SUCKED! I don't know what happened. It was a recipe from Ragu that I'd made before, but the meatballs just didn't turn out well at all.

But leave it to Real Simple to offer me a new meatball recipe AND several ways to eat the meatballs aside from traditional spaghetti and meatballs.

pasta with meatballs and spinach

Here is the link to the original recipe for Easy Meatballs. I, of course, had to make them gluten-free by using leftover gluten-free bread slices. I actually made the meatballs on a Sunday, then froze them in two batches for reheating and eating during the week. The Easy Meatballs recipe makes 40 meatballs, and the following two meals each require 20 of those meatballs.

First up: Pasta with Meatballs and Spinach
This was really good (my husband went back for seconds) and easy to make! If you've already made the meatballs and frozen them, all you have to do at dinnertime is cook the pasta, pop the meatballs under the broiler for 20 minutes, and cook the mushrooms and thyme in about 2 tbsp. of butter. (The recipe isn't clear on how much butter to use, so I started with 1 tbsp. but it didn't look like enough so I added the second.) When the meatballs and pasta are ready, stir them in with the mushrooms and thyme, and add the spinach and grated pecorino cheese. YUM.

cheesy baked meatballs

These meatballs reminded me more of meatloaf than Italian meatballs. Probably the Worcestershire sauce.

Next: Cheesy Baked Meatballs
I liked this, but I think we needed to bake it a few minutes longer. The sauce wasn't as hot as I hoped. I used fontinella cheese instead of fontina because I couldn't find any fontina cheese that was pre-sliced or sold as a block. I think it still worked fine. It melted okay, but I think if I had left this in the oven just a few minutes longer it would have melted up more. It tasted good on top of the meatballs, though!