Tonight, I made simple spaghetti and meatballs. I love this recipe because it was the first healthy dinner I had ever cooked by myself. Lessons learned: If your brother wants to help you with dinner, it’s only because he wants you to do the dishes. Tonight, I used pre-cooked meatballs, but you can make meatballs with ground beef or turkey. Enjoy!
Spaghetti and meatballs
Ingredients
Pasta Sauce
Spaghetti (you can make spaghetti out of zucchini)
Beef or Turkey Meatballs
Shredded Parmesan Cheese
Salt
Instructions
Boil water in a large saucepan. Salt the water. (The water needs to taste like the sea according to Mario Batali but I just put in a large pinch.)
In another small sauce pan, dump in the sauce and your pre-cooked meatballs. Stir it around for a little bit. Don’t put the heat too high or the sauce will bubble too much and the sauce will splatter out of the pan.
Once the water in the first saucepan has started boiling, dump in the spaghetti and wait for the pasta to be, as my mom calls it, al dente which means cooked but still a bit firm—not totally soggy. When it is done, dump it into a strainer.
If you want zucchini pasta, you can use a spiral cutter like I did or you can just cut them into long, thin strips that look about the size of a spaghetti noodle. Coat a skillet in olive oil, warm it up on medium heat, and then put the zucchini in the pan. Sprinkle with a little salt. Stir it around until it is also al dente.
Put the pasta or zucchini on the plates and top with sauce and meatballs. Put some shredded cheese on top if you want to.