-from my kitchen- a little italian

When I was a child my parents were always in the kitchen cooking up one thing or another. I don't remember ever hanging out watching everything they did or getting lessons from them. I often wonder if there's such a thing as a natural cook if there is then I'm one. I just like to cook by taste, sight, smell and even sound. I don't do anything fancy- at least I don't think so,  but I guess it helps that I enjoy doing it. I guess it doesn't hurt that like to entertain as well.

My younger brother is the same way, I should probably give him a shout out since we have upon occasion had a bit of sibling rivalry about a certain methods of cooking a particular thing. You can read about it here if you click on meatball wars  It's a post I did on my vacation blog we're on hawaiian time about our family vacation at our older brothers in Hawaii when we cooked an Italian night dinner together.

In the past few weeks I have gotten two separate requests from different friends who were doing cook books and wanted to include a few recipes of things that I cook regularly in them. If a friend wants a recipe, you know what I have to do? I have to cook whatever they want from scratch so that I can measure every ingredient and write it down for them.

Today I put together the actual recipe for Italian sauce and meatballs/ hot sausage. We're gonna eat it later with spaghetti and a salad. The left overs I usually freeze and it will go to my son who lives up in the city, and he'll do Italian night when the guys come over to watch sports. I would be remiss if I did not mention my son is an alumni of VCU and the basketball team from that University is going to the big dance....GO RAMS!!

Italian Sauce & Meatballs

SAUCE

INGREDIENTS:

2- 28 oz. cans crushed tomatoes (hunts) plus ¾ can of water

¼ cup olive oil

3 cloves fresh garlic whole

1tbsp. Parsley (dried- fresh if best)

½ tsp. Oregano (dried) if fresh basil is in season use that instead

1tsp salt

1tsp sugar

METHOD:

1.      Put oil in the bottom of a sauté pan ( not aluminum)

2.      Add garlic, be sure not to let it burn.

3.      Then add on can of tomatoes and ¾ can of water and all the spices

4.      Bring to a boil, then add the other can and reduce to a simmer.

5.      Cook for 1 ½ hours uncovered.

MEATBALLS

INGREDIENTS:

½ cup parmesan cheese

2 eggs beaten

1 tbsp garlic powder

2 tbsp parsley

2 lbs ground beef (you can use 1/3 part ground pork)

¾ cup plain bread crumbs

 olive oil for cooking

METHOD:

1.   Mix the first four ingredients in a large bowl.

2.      Then add the ground meat and blend them both well.

3.      Sprinkle the bread crumbs and mix them until they are full incorporated in the meat.

4.      Form the meatballs- they can be any size.

5.      Heat a frying pan with some oil and fry the meatballs so that they are browned- they do not have to be cooked fully thru. ( you will see pink, so  don’t worry)

6.      Add them to the sauce.

7.      This recipe makes 25 Forbes size meatballs, enjoy! Sauté hot or sweet Italian sausages and add to sauce .
      
     They'll be more recipes coming after this,  if you try this one please let me know what you think.