I’ve been dieting. Yes, I have. By dieting, I really mean changing the way I eat and what I eat. I’ve been watching food portions and cutting out a lot of processed foods and refined sugars. In doing this, I’ve come up with some nice, good foods to eat and I’m sharing my very very simple recipes for pasta sauce and meatballs.
Quick & Easy Meatballs
- 4 ounces ground chuck
- Salt & Pepper to taste
- 2 tsp Italian seasoning
- 2 tsp garlic powder or 1 clove garlic, minced
Directions
Add your seasonings to the ground chuck to suit your tastes and mix by hand. Make into 4 equal size meatballs. Add 2 tsp coconut oil to frying pan and brown meatballs. Once browned, add 2 tablespoons of water and reduce heat to low, covering. Yes, I essentially steamed the meatballs versus frying or baking. Should be done in about 10 – 15 minutes. Remove from pan and drain on wire rack. You will use any remaining juices in your frying pan for the pasta sauce.
You may think that there should be breadcrumbs or eggs (heck even oatmeal), but these meatballs really did hold together nicely and stayed juicy and yummy.
Quick & Easy Pasta Sauce
- 1 medium tomato
- 1 tsp sea salt
- 2 cloves garlic
- Pepper to taste
- 1 tablespoon Italian seasoning
- Reserved juices from the meatballs
Directions
- Take tomato and garlic and add to blender or food processor, pureeing. I did not peel the tomato. Once I had pureed it, I also did not strain the seeds out. You are welcome to peel and strain out the seeds if you’d like.
- Add tomato and garlic to the leftover juices from your steamed meatballs. Add sea salt, black pepper, and Italian seasoning. Bring to a boil. Reduce hit and simmer for 10 – 20 minutes or until desired thickness reached. I did not add any thickeners and just let the sauce reduce down. You can add your meatballs back in while you simmer or you can choose to keep them on the side.
If you don’t keep fresh tomatoes on hand, you can use 1/2 a can of organic tomato sauce and season to your preference.
Once sauce and meatballs are finished, spoon them over 1 cup of your preferred pasta. I used spaghetti squash that was still slight crunchy. You can use whatever noodles you prefer. If you’re like me and don’t know how to cook spaghetti squash because you’ve never used it before, here’s a tip. Microwave the squash for a little bit and then take a chef’s knife and cut it in half lengthways. Gently take out seeds with a spoon. Be careful to not dig too deep otherwise you’ll start loosing some of your “noodles”. Put in a baking dish cut sides down. Add about 1/2 inch to an inch of water to the bottom of the pan. Cover in foil and bake for 45 minutes to an hour until knife goes through easily (or desired doneness of noodles is reached). I can’t remember, but I think I baked it at 350, but I’m not 100% certain.
Spaghetti squash is yummy and doesn’t have a strong enough flavor to detract from the sauce and meatballs. However, it does not agree with my digestive system, so I’m forced to forgo. Zucchini noodles and sweet potato noodles don’t seem to have any ill effect on me, so I use those now instead.
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