spaghetti + meatballs
Let me start by saying that this Sunday supper took forever to prepare and should not be attempted unless you have time and patience (and a lot of wine). The most recent issue of Cook’s Illustrated points out that meatballs are a lot of work, so you should make a whole bunch all at once. Their recipe swaps out veal for gelatin and prosciutto, and milk-soaked bread for panko (flaky Japanese breadcrumbs) and buttermilk. We roughly halved the recipe. Instead of baking the meatballs, I insisted on frying them in batches in a pan and making a simple tomato sauce in that same pan. During a moment of good judgment, I ditched the original plan to make the pasta ourselves and pulled out a package of some fancy dry spaghetti we’d been gifted awhile back. We went back and forth between the living room (homework and televised sports) and the kitchen (frying meat, simmering sauce) to divvy up all the steps. Several dropped meatballs, sauce splatters, and glasses of wine later, we sat down to (wolfed down) a satisfying meal that tucked us quietly into bed. Even better, we have two batches’ worth of leftovers that will probably come out of the freezer during study-freak finals season or in November if we completely mess up Thanksgiving dinner.
