If you like meatballs, you will love this recipe!
- meatballs:
- pepper (to taste)
- goat cheese
- extra virgin olive oil
- 2 eggs lightly beaten
- 1 pound lean beef
- 2 cloves garlic cloves
- 1 sweet onion
- 3/4 cup breadcrumbs
- 1/4 cup fresh basil (extra to top off when serving)
- parmesan cheese (to taste)
- cheese (to taste) other tasty, i used a hard cheese
- onion powder (to taste)
- garlic powder (to taste)
- lemon salt (to taste)
- seasoning salt (to taste)
- cayane pepper (to taste)
- noodles:
- thin spaghetti
- 1 tsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tbsp butter/margarine
- Carbohydrate 38.0422125 g
- Cholesterol 293.9765 mg
- Fat 30.7392975 g
- Fiber 2.77787497609854 g
- Protein 34.0554725 g
- Saturated Fat 11.8729825 g
- Serving Size 1 1 Serving (297g)
- Sodium 509.6285 mg
- Sugar 35.2643375239015 g
- Trans Fat 4.047189 g
- Calories 570 calories
Step-by-step
- Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl.
- Cook 4-5 minutes in light oil in a skillet to make them take shape and add a little crisp. Cook half your meatballs at a time.
- Remove meatballs from heat
- Place meatballs back in the skillet with low/med heat and pour tomato sauce over in the pan (we used a spicy red pepper sauce)
- Cover and simmer for 20 minutes. This keeps the meatballs juicy and cooks them all the way through adding the tomato sauce flavor.
- Cook noodles in water with a drop of oil and drain.
- Apply light butter to the noodles (about 1 tablespoon).
- Scope noodles onto plate, place 2 meatballs on top with sauce. Top with basil, serve.
Swapping lean beef for ground turkey will immediately dry out these meatballs during the twenty-minute simmer. Lean beef possesses just enough fat to maintain moisture, but adding poultry without adjusting the binder ratio transforms the mixture into a crumbly paste. Skeptical cooks often watch this dish fail because they overwork the meat mixture in the bowl. When protein strands are kneaded too aggressively with breadcrumbs and eggs, the resulting texture becomes dense and rubbery rather than tender.
Success hinges entirely on gentle handling during the initial mixing phase and proper searing temperatures. Combine the lean beef, lightly beaten eggs, breadcrumbs, minced garlic, chopped sweet onion, fresh basil, and seasonings just until incorporated. Form the portions loosely to allow heat to penetrate evenly. Cook the spheres for four to five minutes in a skillet with light oil, turning them to build a crisp exterior crust without fully cooking the interior. Overcrowding the pan drops the oil temperature and creates steam instead of a crust, so fry only half the batch at a time.
Simmering the browned meatballs in tomato sauce for twenty minutes on low to medium heat finishes the cooking process while driving moisture inward. Quantities easily scale up or down depending on the yield needed, provided the proportions of eggs to meat remain consistent. When doubling the batch, use two separate skillets for the initial sear rather than crowding a single pan.
