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How to Make Spaghetti and Meatballs with Garlic Bread | Julia at Home

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- Today, I'm gonna make (upbeat lively music)

spaghetti meatballs, which is a classic dinner in my house.

But these aren't just any old meatballs.

These are Davison house meatballs.

And if you come to dinner here

on spaghetti and meatball night, this is what you get.

And I love 'em because they're insanely easy to make.

You could have this whole dinner done in less than an hour.

Now I'm also gonna carve it up a bit

and throw in some homemade garlic bread.

And we're gonna start by toasting the garlic

for the garlic bread.

That just mellows its flavor

and makes it a little easier to work into a paste.

So you're gonna need 9 or 10 cloves of garlic.

And you can see I've separated the cloves

from the head of garlic, but I've left the papery skins on.

We're gonna toast the garlic on the stove in their skins.

So here I have a little skillet.

And I'm just gonna add again, 9 or 10 cloves.

One, two, three, four, five, oh, come back here.

Five, six, seven, eight

(laughing) 8, 9, 10, all right.

And I'm just gonna toast these over medium heat.

Takes about 8 to 10 minutes.

I'm gonna give this skillet a good little jostle

every now and again.

And the garlic's gonna soften

and those papery skins are gonna get spotty brown.

And that's how you know your garlic is nicely toasted.

All right, while that's going,

let's get started on the easiest meatballs in the world.

Now I helped develop this recipe 20-some years ago.

And I loved it because it was super fast.

You could get these meatballs in the skillet in minutes.

And that's what we're gonna do today.

Now it's starting with turkey.

But of course over the years,

I've found you can use any kind of meat.

We often make 'em with all beef

or a combination of beef and pork.

But Turkey's really nice, especially if it's a weekday.

All, right, and so this is the magic right here.

A container of pesto.

This is a seven ounce container of pesto.

And this is the pre-made stuff, obviously.

So this pesto is from the refrigerator and that's key.

You don't want the jarred stuff on the shelf

in the grocery store.

You want to get the chilled stuff.

Usually next to the hummus, if you're in my grocery store.

And you're gonna add the whole container,

seven ounces of pesto, to a pound and a half of meat.

And now for the binder, we're just gonna use panko.

That is Japanese breadcrumbs.

We're gonna add 2/3 of a cup.

This helps absorb some of the moisture

and also makes a bit of a panade

with the moisture in the pesto.

That's 1/3 of a cup, 2/3 of a cup.

We're gonna add a little bit of salt,

just half a teaspoon of table salt.

And a little bit of pepper.

And now the fun part.

Get in there with your hands, take your rings off.

I took my rings off already

because you're gonna use your hands

and just knead this together.

Now, of course you could use a spatula if you wanted to,

but it's more fun to get your hands in there.

And actually I think your fingers do a better job

of incorporating all those ingredients.

All right, so if you think about that pesto

has garlic, has Parmesan, has some nuts,

and of course it has all that basil

and a little bit of olive oil.

And all that flavoring just makes it so easy

to make a flavorful meatball with half the work.

I'd say less than half the work, all right.

So there we have it.

Now I'm gonna portion the meatballs.

Now, different days, I get different size meatballs.

Sometimes the meatballs are really big.

Sometimes they're really teeny.

Usually I wind up with about 16 or so meatballs.

I like using a spring-loaded scoop.

It helps me portion a little bit better.

And at the end of the day,

it doesn't matter how big the meatballs are

as long as they're the same size

so that they cook at the same rate.

Using the scoop to help me portion,

roll it into a meatball, and then you drop it.

Oh, those look different.

See, that's not gonna cook at the same rate.

So at this point I decide which size am I going for?

I think I'm gonna go for the smaller size.

Those are better, all right.

So that's the size we're going for today.

Let's see how many we get.

So we started making these meatballs

when my daughter was really young,

just 'cause they're so blissfully easy.

And actually my husband Ian

has taken on most of the meatball cookery these days.

And he's twisted this recipe a lot.

He, as I mentioned,

he likes to use a combination of meats

and sometimes he sneaks some other stuff in there

he hasn't even told me about.

His secret meatballs.

But either way, these are the only meatballs

my daughter will eat.

Even if we go to like a really nice Italian restaurant

and they have amazing meatballs, she'll be like,

"Nope, this is not my meatball."

So these are these pesto meatballs super fast.

The only meatball she'll eat.

So these meatballs are ready for the stove.

And that's one of the reasons why I love this recipe.

You can make the meatballs

and just start cooking them right away.

So here I have my favorite 12 inch non-stick skillet.

I'm using non-stick on purpose

because I want the browning to stick to the meatballs,

not to the pan.

To the skillet I'm gonna add about tablespoon of oil.

Gonna heat this up over medium heat.

When that oil begins to shimmer

is when I know the pan is hot enough to brown the meatballs.

Now duly noted,

these meatballs will not stay round as they cook.

They will flatten on both sides

and almost look like one of those poofs.

Which, I don't care.

You know, they're gonna taste just as good and it's fast.

If you do want to round meatball, however,

it is easy to attain.

Simply tack on about 20 minutes.

Throw this tray into the refrigerator,

let those meatballs firm up

and they'll hold their shape better.

The pan looks good and hot.

Let's brown the meatballs.

I know, I'm giving one last roll as I put 'em in.

Just maybe this time they'll stay a bit more round.

I know they won't, habit.

It's also a habit to put things in the pan counterclockwise.

Why? I don't know, just makes me happy.

I mean, yes, if you're cooking scallops,

it's good to put them in the pan

so you know which went in the pan first.

This sort of thing, it doesn't really matter.

All right, so those meatballs

will take 8 to 10 minutes to brown.

I'm gonna roll 'em around, shake the pan,

try to get them brown on as many sides as possible.

And they brown really quickly.

Again, 'cause it's Turkey 'cause it's white meat,

so that browns quickly.

And also all that pesto and all that oil

will really help it brown.

So I'm gonna turn the heat down a bit

and really watch it so they don't get too charred.

(upbeat rock music)

Okay, so meatballs are browning, the garlic's toasted.

Look at that, that's beautiful.

You can see it looks burnt, which is perfect.

It's not burnt on the inside.

It'll be a little charred.

It's soft, hot.

I'm gonna let these cool a little bit.

Then we'll peel them and mash them

with a little butter for the garlic bread later.

And the only other prep I really have to do

is deal with the tomato sauce,

because you need tomato sauce for the meatballs.

So what I'm gonna do is

I'm gonna use three cans of tomatoes here.

And they're the 14 1/2 ounce,

the little guy, diced tomatoes.

And I like using diced tomatoes

because I want two textures in the sauce.

I want a nice, smooth sauce, but I want bits of tomato.

So what I'm gonna do is take two of the cans

and I'm gonna process them 'til they're nice and smooth.

But I'm gonna leave this third can as it is.

That way you'll get a nice variety of textures.

You can use a food processor.

I think a blender's a bit easier.

(blender whirring)

All right, that's it for the tomatoes.

That is good browning.

So what I'm gonna do is try to get that same browning

all over each meatball.

All right, and the last bit of prep I have to do

is simply to chop an onion to give a little base of flavor

to the tomato sauce.

I'm gonna cut it as small as possible

because my 12 year old does not like to see chunks of onion.

So the smaller, the better in her world.

All right, so I'm just gonna finish chopping up this onion,

browning the meatballs, and then we can make the sauce

and make the garlic bread.

Take a look at these meatballs.

Whoa, maybe I should start calling them meat poofs,

'cause they're not really balls anymore.

This one's almost got a pyramid shape to it.

All right, so I'm gonna take them out the pan.

They're not all the way cooked through.

They're just nicely browned.

I'm gonna finish cooking them in the sauce.

That way they'll cook through

and the sauce will get more flavor.

Take them out of the pan.

You can see a lot of oil has come

out of these meatballs 'cause I used a lot of pesto.

We're gonna save some of that oil

'cause that oil is really good flavor for the sauce.

But depending on the brand of pesto,

you get different amounts of oil that come out.

And that's just a bit too much for me.

A little goes a long way.

So I'm gonna pour it all out and then just add some back.

Whoop, all right.

Add a little less than half that back.

Into the hot pan goes the onion.

Always gonna add a little bit of salt with the onion.

Just a pinch or two.

And this onion, oh, turn the heat down a bit.

That should be on medium heat.

Skillet's pretty hot because it's been browning meatballs

for the past 10 minutes.

So we're gonna let these onions cook down,

eh, about five, seven minutes.

All right, that means it's time to turn our attention

to the garlic bread, which is quite frankly

my favorite part of this whole meal.

I don't make it every time I make meatballs

because it's a lot of carbs, but man is it good.

And this recipe is an oldie, but a goodie.

It's well over 20 years old, and it was originally developed

by my dear friend Adam Reid,

who is the gadget guy on "America's Test Kitchen".

I've worked with him for over two decades.

And it's just so simple.

And it's just a loaf of bread.

Now, obviously this is one of those

Italian football style loaves.

It's a supermarket loaf.

It's squishy.

It doesn't have a thick crust.

It is not an artisanal loaf.

And that is what you want.

You want supermarket Italian bread for this.

All right, so obviously we're gonna cut it in half.

Use a sharp knife.

Now cutting it in half is harder than it looks.

So what I do is I go slow.

I stand it on end.

And I really make sure I look through both sides

'cause you really don't want the top to be too thick.

So go slow.

Slice it through.

There you go.

All right, set those aside.

Now we've gotta make the flavorful butter

that's gonna go on top.

And here I have six tablespoons of unsalted butter.

I know it's a lot of butter, so sue me,

but it's a lot of bread.

Now to the butter we're gonna add garlic.

And here's the toasted garlic.

You see, I'm gonna peel this off, peel off this outer paper.

And you can see that the cloves underneath

still have a little of that browning on it.

That's good caramelized garlic flavor.

I love that.

So I'm gonna peel off all the papery skins.

And they kind of just fall off, really.

There is all of our toasted garlic.

All right, now I'm gonna chop up the garlic,

but I'm gonna sprinkle it with a little bit of salt.

That salt just adds a little bit of texture,

almost like sand on sand paper to make it easier

to chop up the sticky garlic.

You can see how soft this garlic is.

I'm gonna chop it into rough pieces

and then I'm actually gonna scrape it

against the side of the board to make a nice garlic paste

that'll meld really well with the butter.

Now it's not as soft as roasted garlic.

That's much softer and has a much more roasty flavor.

This is toasted garlic.

So it a little has a little bit of that raw flavor,

which is perfect for this garlic bread.

Never happened.

Never, oh, it's so good.

All right, so there's the garlic paste

right into this bowl of unsalted butter.

Again, that's six tablespoons.

I use unsalted because salt amounts in salted butter

vary so much based on the brand of butter you buy.

So if I buy unsalted butter,

I can add the salt myself, which I prefer.

I'm gonna add a little more salt.

Last but not least gonna add some Parmesan,

about two tablespoons there about.

Maybe a little extra.

Yeah, it's good.

Oh look, a piece fell off.

I hate it when that happens.

All right, so that's the garlic bread.

So I'm just gonna take about half of this

and I'm gonna spread it on the bread.

I'm using this very stiff spatula

that I think was a freebie.

I think this came like with the food processor or something.

And when it came in the box, I thought,

"Well, who'd want a spatula that's that stiff?"

Well, it turns out it has a couple good uses,

for this and for getting dog food out of a can.

That's its other good use we've found.

And so when my husband feeds the dog.

He's always looking for the white spatula.

All right, let's put this on a sheet pan.

And this is ready for the oven.

Now I'm not gonna put it in the oven right away.

It bakes in about 10 minutes

and it tastes so good when it's fresh out of the oven.

So I'm gonna time it so we can put it in the oven

right before we eat so it's good and fresh.

But I like getting it ready ahead of time.

All right, let's take a look at these onions.

Oh look, nice and soft,

getting a little brown and caramelized around the edges.

Just perfect.

Those caramelized bits add a lot of flavor

to an otherwise pretty simple sauce

just made with canned tomatoes.

All right, to this we're gonna add a little bit of garlic,

some pepper flakes, some chili flakes.

I always eye the amount of chili flakes.

That was actually a bit more than I usually add.

And we're gonna add some garlic.

So this is three clothes of garlic,

raw garlic, not the toasted stuff.

And I'm gonna use a garlic press.

I love garlic presses.

I know people, especially professional chefs say,

"Oh, a garlic press is no good."

Well maybe they're not making dinner on a Tuesday

after they've been filming all day, you know what I mean?

Because, oh, it just makes it so easy.

I don't even peel the garlic anymore.

I just take the garlic, I trim off the end.

And I put it cut side down in the hopper.

And right over the skillet, squeezing it out.

Nothing but net.

For midweek cooking, that's the kind of tip

that will save you a good couple minutes.

All right, don't need to cook the garlic

or the pepper flakes for very long.

Just until you smell them, just for about 30 seconds.

And I turn the heat way down because the onions

are starting to really get nice and golden.

I don't want to get them too browned.

All right, starting to smell the garlic.

Starting to smell the chili flakes.

Now it's time to add the tomatoes.

That's the can of diced tomatoes that I did nothing with.

And then here's the pureed tomatoes.

Ah, that's a tomato sauce.

So we're just gonna let this tomato sauce

simmer for about 10 minutes

before we add the meatballs back to the pan.

And over the years, I've tried skimping

on the simmering time just 'cause I've been in a rush,

and I've regretted it every time

because it takes a good 10 minutes for that tomato,

that tinny canned tomato flavor to evaporate.

So give it 10 minutes,

then we'll add the meatballs back to the sauce.

So the meatballs can cook through

and the meatballs can give some flavor to the sauce.

So all in all, it's not very long, really.

20 minutes and the meatballs will be done from here.

Just give that sauce about 10 minutes.

Then we can drop the meatballs in the sauce,

drop the pasta, throw the garlic bread in the oven

and dinner is on its way.

That sauce has been simmering for 10 minutes.

The garlic bread's ready for the oven,

and the pasta water is ready for the pasta.

Now I don't salt my pasta water before I bring it to boil.

Unlike my husband, who salts it then brings it to a boil.

So it's a constant discussion in our house

whether the water hasn't been salted.

But because I'm cooking, it hasn't been salted.

It's a big pot of water.

The more water, the better when cooking pasta really.

And this is a pound of spaghetti.

This is my favorite brand of spaghetti

because it's on the chubby side

(laughing) like me.

And it kind of balloons up and has a really good mouth feel.

And it tastes amazing.

This texture's not for everyone, this thicker spaghetti.

But like I said, it's my favorite.

All right, turning the pasta back on high.

Want to bring that water

back to a boil as quickly as possible.

I remember growing up, I used to watch

Julia Child in the kitchen all the time.

I mean, who didn't, right?

And she had this poker,

she had like a hot poker from the fireplace

that she would heat up on the stove.

And after she dropped the pasta in the water,

she would stick the poker in the water

to bring it back to a boil.

I haven't graduated to that yet.

It's still a little scary.

I'll try a lot of things.

Maybe I'll ask for a pasta poker for Christmas

'cause I kind of want to try it

and see if it makes a difference.

All right, so I've added all the spaghetti.

I'm also just tossing it around.

If you don't toss it around right when it gets in the water,

I think it tends to stick together,

especially this brand, which is a bit thicker.

So just gonna take a minute,

stir the pasta, separate it with tongs.

All right, make sure it's all submerged.

I put the lid back on just a little cockeyed,

'cause I want to trap as much heat as I can

to bring that water back.

But if you put it all the way on, obviously it'll boil over.

So that's how I cook my pasta.

All right, these meatballs, ready for the sauce.

Oh, yeah.

(Julia singing)

That song always comes in my head

when I'm making spaghetti and meatballs.

I don't know why.

All right, so meatballs are in.

Again, this is just gonna help those meatballs cook through.

It's gonna flavor the sauce nicely.

And so I'm just gonna spin the meatballs around,

make sure they're well coated with sauce.

Bring it back to just a gentle simmer.

And I'm gonna put the lid on, help trap the steam,

help warm the meatballs through, cook 'em through.

But I don't want to evaporate anymore of that sauce.

'Cause I want that sauce to have really nice consistency.

I don't want it to get too thick.

Last but not least, this guy's ready for the oven.

500 degree oven, ripping hot, as hot as you can get it.

About eight minutes or so.

Halfway through we'll spin it around

so that it browns evenly on all sides.

So, pasta takes 10 to 12 minutes.

Meatballs take 10 minutes.

Garlic bread takes 8 to 10 minutes.

We're in the last throws of cooking here.

Next step we get to eat and make a salad.

Pasta is almost done.

The meatballs are done.

I'm actually gonna turn them off

and they can just stay warm in the hot sauce.

The bread, let's take a look at the bread.

Oh, it smells good.

Could use just a few more minutes.

Yep, just two more minutes on the clock for that.

It is time then to make the salad.

We need to have a little something green on the table.

And this is my favorite salad.

It's not a recipe, really.

Actually, I tried to write it down as a recipe

in a cookbook 15 years ago,

in the big America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook.

It was this big ring-bound book, which you can still buy.

It's no longer ring bound.

It's a white traditional book.

And I tried to write this down,

and I managed to make some instructions,

but really it's by feel.

And it starts with a good wooden bowl and a garlic clove.

And so I took the peel off this.

There's a lot of garlic in this dinner.

So it's not vampire friendly dinner.

It's not meant for, or maybe it is for Halloween.

Keep the vampires away.

But what you want to do is put a little garlic.

And I'm rubbing it in the bowl.

And the wood of the bowl acts kind of like sandpaper, right?

And it's just flavoring the bowl with garlic.

So it's just a hint of garlic on the salad,

which is just really nice.

Next we're gonna add some salad greens.

Here I have a variety of salad greens.

Some baby green leaf and a lot of these micro greens.

These are starting to be really popular in the store now,

these little guys.

And you can get cilantro, you can get mache,

you can get all sorts of flavors, sunflower seeds.

I see some of them in there.

That looks like a little piece of chard.

They're just delicate and lovely.

They add texture and flavor to a really boring salad.

And they're easy, right?

Just wash 'em up, add 'em to the salad.

Next gonna add the olive oil.

This is when you want to pull out your good olive oil.

Don't use a wimpy olive oil.

Use a really nice extra virgin olive oil.

You just want to drizzle.

Drizzle 'til it's glossy.

That was what I wrote in the cookbook,

'cause I couldn't figure out

how to tell people how much oil.

I mean as much oil as you want, right?

But if it's too much, it's too much.

Now believe it or not, this was a salad growing up.

Olive oil and salt.

And it is delicious.

It's like my first salad.

But we're gonna add just a little bit of pepper,

gonna kick it up a little notch.

And when pepper's kicking it up a notch,

you know, I'm cooking really simply.

And then last but not least

is when you add a little bit of vinegar.

Put my thumb over it.

I say vinegar, I think in the recipe,

I said, "Vinegar 'til it's sparkles."

I don't really know what that means,

but I couldn't think of a better term than 'til it sparkles.

Now I like to mix vinegar, red wine vinegar,

which is what that is with just a little lemon juice.

That combo to me is perfection.

Not a lot, just a little.

All right, salad's done.

Let's check the garlic bread.

Oh, goodness, doesn't that look terrible?

I don't think I should serve this.

I think I should eat it all myself.

Little salt and pepper on it right out of the oven.

Oh, so good.

I'm gonna let this cool for a few minutes

before I slice into it.

Meatballs, as I said, are done.

They're sitting there nice and warm.

Last but not least, let's check the pasta.

Only one way to check if the pasta is done.

And that's to ask your husband to come in

and taste it for you.

I'm just kidding.

Ian, just kidding.

I see people throwing against the wall.

I've actually never thrown pasta at the wall.

I mean I know it doesn't work.

Sounds fun, sounds like a mess to clean up though.

Only way to test pasta is done is to eat it.

I'm cooling it off right now.

This is my patented method

for cooling off spaghetti before you taste it.

Perfect.

This is an old ATK trick.

So in the sink I have a colander.

And in the colander, I have a liquid measuring cup.

And what it does

is when you're in the rush of making dinner

and you're always draining pasta at the last minute,

you always forget to save some of the pasta cooking water.

And that water is flavored, it's starchy.

And it is a great way to loosen up a sauce

if it's been sitting a while and it's gotten too thick.

So, the trick worked again.

Taking some pasta water out just in case we need it.

This goes back in the sink.

Now I get to drain the pasta.

Another ATK trick, how to drain pasta.

Don't shake it.

You just hold it up for 10 seconds.

Don't ask me why 10 seconds.

But every time I count to 10, 7, 8, 9, 10.

'Cause you want some of that water left in there.

That water is a good sort of way to keep the pasta loose.

All right, I'm gonna take some of the sauce

from the skillet, add it to the pot of pasta.

Now I know everyone likes to put the Parmesan over the top.

I like to mix a little Parmesan in with the pasta

just 'cause I can't get enough Parmesan.

Also, I think it helps that first bit of sauce

stick really well to the pasta.

All right, so when serving this,

you can serve it straight from the stove top, obviously,

especially if it's a weekday.

But in our house we wind up plattering a lot of things.

And my husband actually worked at this big spaghetti house

here in Boston called Vinny Testa's way back in the day.

I mean, he might have been a teenager.

And so everything gets pretty much served

on a big white platter.

Sometimes they're oval like this one.

I'm just gonna dump, oh, that's how I style food.

I don't style it. (laughing)

You know, I'm told if you spin, if you really were into it,

you can make spiny things in the pasta.

I swear, I've done this a million times.

It just gets covered up by the meatballs.

But you can play with that if you want to.

All right, next, the meatballs go right on top.

And actually this is a dinner

that sometimes when neighbors need a little helping hand

or they need dinner brought over, this is what we do.

We make a big platter of spaghetti and meatballs

and garlic bread and salad

and just bring the whole platter right to their house.

It's a really nice thing to give to a neighbor

who is in a rough spot and just needs

a hot dinner at the ready.

Here I have some fresh basil.

I don't chiffonade basil in real life.

I know I do it on TV and I think it's fun and it's pretty.

I also think it's a little precious for home.

I like big pieces of basil.

And sometimes I don't even take a knife to it.

I don't want to beat the basil up that much.

So I'll just take my fingers and tear off pieces of basil

and leave 'em nice big hunks.

If it's too small, it winds up looking like grass clippings.

All right, there's spaghetti meatballs.

Some nice basil on top.

Last but not least, this garlic bread.

Just cut this up into nice pieces

so people can just grab it right off the platter.

I like leaving a few big pieces for Mr. Ian

because he likes the garlic bread.

And you know what I want to do

is put a little more Parm on the top of that pasta.

There it is.

I have like three of these microplane zesters.

I love them.

And I use them for everything from garlic and Parm.

It's perfect for ginger.

That looks good, (energetic upbeat music)

and that's dinner.

Basically as easy as it gets

and so fast for a midweek.

Make up some plates for everybody.

All right, Marta likes the centers, Ian likes the ends.

I like the middle.

Marta gets two meatballs.

I like three meatballs and lots of room for salad.

I like jamming the salad right on the plate

with everything else, old school.

Of course you could serve it separately in a bowl

if you didn't want to get all sassy.

But getting a little of the tomato sauce on the greens

is kind of what spaghetti dinner's about.

Little salad for Marta.

I always give her more salad than she eats

just in hopes that one day she will love salad.

One day, it's gonna happen one day.

Nice big portion for Ian.

And that's an overflowing plate of food.

Just like we like it here in the Davison household.

Let's take a little taste before they get here.

Perfect meatball.

Oh, and this bread, are you kidding me?

That fluffy bread.

Perfection.

All right, and that's dinner.

Dinner is served at the Davison house.

Thanks for watching and see you next time.

Marta, Ian, dinner.

Thanks for watching.

What'd you think?

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How to Make Spaghetti and Meatballs with Garlic Bread | Julia at Home