Spaghetti and Meatballs

I received the November 2010 copy of Cook's Illustrated and found two recipes that looked very appealing. One is pot roast (sounds like a recipe from the 60's) and the other was spaghetti and meatballs. Meatballs seemed right up my alley so I was all in. The recipe is on the Cook's Illustrated site, but it is a paid site; my version is here.

This recipe was billed as spaghetti and meatballs for a crowd. This recipe serves 12 people. There would be four of us for dinner: Carla and me, Jeff, and Linda. I knew we'd want to send some home with Jeff and keep some for a 2nd dinner later in the week so I figured I'd cut it in 2/3's and make it for 8.

I took Friday off and did the grocery shopping figuring I'd have all kinds of time Saturday for cooking. I got kind of busy on Saturday morning though spending some time at Summer Lake Park where the Beaverton Rotary club was having a barbecue cook-off. Herb, by best bud, was an organizer and I thought I'd stop by to see how it was going. Had a nice chat with Herb, Bob, and Patrick, but didn't see anything but closed lids; as they say: "if you're lookin' you ain't cookin'".

Anyway, by the time I finally settled down to review the recipe in the afternoon, I realized I'd better get busy. Cook's Illustrated recipes are usually good, but they take a lot of ingredients and I wind up with a messy kitchen and a LOT of dirty dishes. This would be no exception. I tried to get pictures as I went along, but I ended up fighting the clock, and couldn't grab as many pics as I would have liked.

Here are the ingredients for the meatballs. It's hard to make out, but I have 4 ounces of prosciutto on the bottom right of the picture:

I wanted to get pictures of the mixture then of the meatballs; but I would have had raw beef and pork everywhere. I need to recruit someone to take pictures as I go.

After forming the mixture into 2 oz balls, they go on two racks in cooking sheets. After roasting for 30 minutes (flipping and changing position after 15 minutes) they come out looking delicious. Jeff had just come over and we couldn't help but take one and divide it up between us. Yum.

While the meatballs were roasting, I started the sauce. I had to grate a large onion to get started and since I was in a hurry ended up with three nice scrapes on my hand. When I make a fist, they line up real nice just like they did on the grater.

After the sauce simmers for 15 minutes, I added the meatballs and put the whole thing back in the oven for an hour. Here it is out of the oven

Another reason I need an assistant is I'm terrible at plating the food; what a mess, noodles flopping off the side of the bowl; spatters of sauce everywhere. But the proof of the pudding is in the eating and this tasted good if I do say so myself.

It wasn't just spaghetti; we had salad too; here is Jeff showing it off while Carla gets ready to sit down.

And we sit down to eat.

This recipe earns 5 stars on my 1 to 5 star rating system. If you are coming over to dinner in the next few months as part of a crowd; you may get this (don't worry, we'll have turkey for Thanksgiving; not pasta).

If you aren't vegetarian, I highly recommend this recipe.