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Meatballs in Spicy Tomato-Basil Sauce
Ground fennel seeds lend these meatballs a subtle licorice-like sweetness, making them reminiscent of Italian sausage. Use a spice grinder or mortar and pestle to grind the whole seeds to a powder, or if you're able to find preground fennel seed at the store, use an equal amount. You can, of course, serve the meatballs and sauce over pasta, or you can tuck the meatballs into toasted sub rolls lined with slices of provolone cheese, spoon some sauce over the top and finish with a sprinkle of grated Parmesan or pecorino.
4
Servings
Tip
Don't use ground beef that's leaner than 85 percent or the meatballs will be dry and bland. When shaping the meat mixture, form it into firm, compact meatballs, not loosely packed orbs; this helps them hold together when pressure cooked. And don't forget to refrigerate the meatballs for at least 15 minutes before cooking, as this helps them retain their shape.
1 hour 10 minutes
20 minutes active, plus chilling and standing time
Ingredients
-
½
cup fine dry breadcrumbs
-
2
28-ounce cans whole peeled tomatoes, drained, juices reserved
Directions
-
01In a large bowl, mix together the breadcrumbs, ½ cup tomato juices, the oregano, fennel seeds and garlic. Add the beef, 1½ teaspoons salt and 1 teaspoon black pepper. Mix with your hands until no streaks of breadcrumbs remain. Divide into 10 portions and form each into a compact ball about 2 inches in diameter, placing the meatballs on a large plate. Refrigerate for 15 minutes.
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July 14, 2023
Perfect weeknight or anytime meatballs
My go-to meatball recipe is usually Milk Street's Neapolitan meatballs, and they're excellent - but these might beat them out based on the quality of the result and the ease/quickness of the process. Really delicious meatballs, plenty of excellent sauce. We had them as meatball subs but will have the leftovers with pasta. Fantastic, very good recipe.
February 24, 2023
Love these meatballs! No eggy taste
Super easy recipe with the instant pot. I mixed a little pork in to the meatballs and they came out great!
December 18, 2022
Delicious!
Made the recipe exactly as stated, it was great!
July 20, 2022
Good meatballs
These take no time to make and delicious. I made these so many times with pork and beef. However, I started to make them with the Impossible burger meat. It actually better than the regular meat because it does not create much fat in the pot that you will need to scoop out with reg meat.
August 27, 2023
Fast/easy
A solid recipe, easy to make, and the dish comes out fine. Followed recipe verbatim, will surely make again.
Hi Lisa -
We don't have a version of this recipe for the stovetop but you can try to convert it yourself. Start by cooking the meatballs in a 400 degree oven until browned and their internal temperature reaches 160 degrees, about 15 minutes. Meanwhile, add the sauce ingredients (tomatoes and juice, butter, red pepper flakes) to a large skillet and cook on the stovetop. At this point you can follow the instructions in Step 3 of the recipe starting with "Bring the tomato mixture to a boil...". Good luck!
Best,
The Milk Street Team
I made this today and it was simply outstanding! Deeply delicious and fairly easy to make. We have no granulated garlic in my area, so I substituted 1/2 tsp. of garlic powder. Used 56 oz. of peeled tomatoes from the garden instead of canned tomatoes. The meatballs are superb, and I'll be returning to this recipe again & again. Thanks, Diane!
This is so delicious! I have not, however, been successful in the 4-5 times I have made it in getting the recipe done in the pressure cooking setting of my instant pot. Each time, as soon as it reaches full pressure, I get the “burn” error. Any suggestions? I have had to finish the meatballs with the sauté setting and lid off to cook them through, or switch to the stovetop/oven method in the comments so that we can enjoy them.
Thank you for such great recipes!
Catherine - the most likely culprit here is that your Instant Pot's burn setting is going off because it picks up on the present of the meatballs on the bottom of the pot and things that they are stuck-on bits of food. In a 6-quart Instant Pot, there is plenty of liquid from the two cans of tomatoes, so it's not for lack of liquid that the burn error is coming up. Next time, rather than pushing the meatballs down to submerge them, try simply placing them atop the sauce and spooning a little sauce over each one. If the meatballs aren't touching the bottom of the pot, you should be able to avoid the burn error. -April D.
My comment is not getting posted. These are very good meatballs. I just do half a teaspoon of oregano and I do not put fennel. It tastes amazing with these spices or without. My family said that the amount of oregano in this recipe was overpowering that is why I only put half a tsp. We have these meatballs every week and with either bread buns or pasta.
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Can you make these without a pressure cooker?