Cloudy with a chance of meatballs

I always crave meatballs.  The majority of the time, however, they are never as good as I want them to be and them I am disappointed, full of mediocre meatballs, and still craving meatballs! All last week, I talked about making meatballs and pasta but never did it so last night I decided it was time.  With it being summer, I always want to grill or do something summery and outside but it was cloudy and gross yesterday so I felt this would be perfect for the weather.

Process went a little like this:

95% ground beef

tomato puree

whole tomatoes

basil

parsley

thyme

oregano

breadcrumbs

egg

salt

pepper

parmesan

onions

garlic

I decided to also make sauce from scratch so the process took a while.  To start, I cooked the garlic and onions in a pot for a couple of minutes with some olive oil.  Then I added the tomato puree, whole tomatoes, salt, pepper, basil, thyme, and oregano.  I let that heat up a bit and to that I added the meatballs. 

To make the meatballs, I just put the beef, breadcrumbs, 1 egg, parmesan, salt, pepper, garlic, milk, parsley, and oregano in a bowl and mixed everything together by hand.  Then I just formed balls out of them and placed them into the already cooking sauce.  The whole mixture, sauce and meatballs, cooked for about 3 hours. 

Sorry for the lack of meatball pics =/

For the pasta, I decided to make a primavera since we already had meat from the meatballs.  The pasta consisted of:

whole wheat spaghetti

squash

zucchini

cherry tomatoes

carrots

bell pepper

onion

salt

pepper

thyme

oregano

I peeled the carrots and then cut them into strips.  I cut the rest of the veggies into strips as well.  Once all cut, I put them all in a big bowl and drizzled olive oil on top along with the spices and mixed them by hand to coat evenly.  Then, I put foil on 2 baking trays and split them up evenly to roast in the oven at 450.  I let them cook for 10 minutes, took them out and tossed, then another 10 minutes.  

While the veggies were cooking, the noodles cooked.  I didn't take a picture of noodles cooking b/c I figured everyone has done that at some point or another. 

So 3 hours later, the sauce and meatballs were done.  20 minutes later, the veggies and noodles were done so all that was left to do was toss everything together.  I put the noodles in a bowl, topped them with veggies, threw the halved cherry tomatoes on top and tossed everything together.  Meatballs and sauce were added to the pasta and the whole thing was topped with parmesan and parsley.  

The meal was delicious! I'm glad that I made the sauce from scratch b/c it was so fresh and delightful.  The veggies were great even without the pasta or sauce.  The whole dish was great and the meatballs turned out so well.  I think my meatball craving is satisfied for at least another week.  The best thing about pasta meals is that they make the best leftovers! They are so good cold.  I ate some this morning for breakfast and didn't even bother to put it in the microwave.