Author Notes
This is the sauce my great, great grandmother used to make every Sunday at our house. It's the cook-for-hours sauce that is made even better with pork neck bones. And her meatballs were awesome. Nana didn't speak much English, but we always knew what "mangia, mangia" meant and she definitely made her love tangible with her cooking....one of my favorite GirlCooks. —GirlCook
Continue After Advertisement
Ingredients
- Nana's Sauce
-
1 can
Tomato Puree
-
1 can
Crushed Tomatoes
-
1
Small Can Tomato Paste
-
1 1/2 can
Water from larger tomato cans
-
1 tablespoon
Dried Oregano (dried on-th-stalk oregano is awesome here if you have it)
-
1 tablespoon
Dried Basil
-
1 tablespoon
Dried Parsley
-
1 dash
Salt
-
1 dash
Hot Pepper Flakes
-
1 dash
Baking Soda
-
1/2 cup
Parmigiano Cheese
-
1/2 cup
Sugar
- Nana's Meatballs
-
5 slices
Bread
-
1/2 cup
Whole Milk
-
1 pound
Ground Beef ( even make these with ground turkey)
-
2
Eggs
-
1/2 cup
Parmigiano Cheese
-
2 cloves
Minced Garlic
-
1/2 teaspoon
Dried Oregano
-
Salt and Pepper to taste
Directions
- Nana's Sauce
-
Put all ingredients in a large pot and simmer for 3 hours.
- Nana's Meatballs
-
Soak the bread in the milk/add enough to make the bread wet and soggy/depending upon the bread, you may need more or less. Break the bread up in the liquid. You can use any kind of white bread, I often use wheat bread.
-
Add all other ingredients and mix the ingredients (Nana used her hands) until well blended.
-
Scoop the meat with an ice cream scoop and place all meatballs onto an ungreased cookie sheet.
-
Bake at 350 degrees for 12-15 minutes.
-
Put the meatballs into the sauce, these can continue to cook for the last 45 minutes of the cooking if desired.
See what other Food52ers are saying.