Recipe Background
It's Slow Cooker Pasta! What more do you need? The meatballs are obviously juicy and perfectly cooked, all that beefy, parmesan-infused goodness in sphere form! The pasta is cooked to tenderness in a rich and spicy tomato sauce! And you have to do very little to make it happen! Slow Cooker Pasta makes pasta night easy! It really is that simple!
It's Slow Cooker Pasta! What more do you need? The meatballs are obviously juicy and perfectly cooked, all that beefy, parmesan-infused goodness in sphere form! The pasta is cooked to tenderness in a rich and spicy tomato sauce! And you have to do very little to make it happen! Slow Cooker Pasta makes pasta night easy! It really is that simple!
Ingredients
For the meatballs:
- 1 pound ground beef
- 1/4 cup breadcrumbs
- 1/4 cup parmesan cheese grated
- 1/4 cup parsley chopped
- 1 large egg beaten
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
For the sauce:
- 2 (28-ounce) cans crushed tomatoes
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- 1/2 yellow onion finely chopped
- 2 teaspoons dried oregano
- 1 clove garlic minced
- kosher salt to taste
- ground black pepper to taste
- red pepper flakes to taste
- 1 1/2 cups low-sodium chicken broth
- 12 ounces spaghetti
- parmesan optional, to taste, grated, for garnish
- parsley optional, to taste, chopped, for garnish
Directions
- In a large bowl, add the ground beef, the breadcrumbs, 1/4 cup of the parmesan cheese, 1/4 cup of the parsley, the egg, 2 cloves of the minced garlic, 1 teaspoon of the salt, and 1/2 teaspoon of the red pepper flakes and using your clean hands, mix gently but thoroughly until combined.
- Form the meat mixture into 16 meatballs.
- Transfer the meatballs to a slow cooker.
- In a separate large bowl, add the crushed tomatoes and their juices, the tomato paste, the onions, the oregano, and the remaining garlic clove and stir to combine.
- Season the sauce mixture with the extra salt, the black pepper, and the extra red pepper flakes.
- Pour the sauce mixture over the meatballs in the slow cooker.
- Cover the slow cooker and cook until the meatballs are almost but not quite cooked through, about 3 hours on high or 5 hours on low.
- Add the broth and the spaghetti to the sauce mixture and stir to coat the noodles.
- Cover the slow cooker and cook on low, while stirring halfway through, until the spaghetti is tender and the meatballs reach an internal temperature of 160 degrees F, about 45 minutes.
- Serve garnished with the extra parmesan and the extra parsley.
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