Meatballs with Pappardelle

At first glance pasta with meatballs looks like something you can whip up in a few minutes, but it is not. Even though you might be able to substitute a simple tomato sauce or just use ground beef, once again Chef Keller proves that every extra step is well worth it. This includes the Oven Roasted Tomato Sauce (p 333) and the Dried Bread Crumbs (p 273) and even the ground meat combination.

I have had several people ask me for this recipe as well as specifically asking for the Oven Roasted Tomato Sauce recipe to use in other meals. Even though it looks pretty time consuming, it really isn’t active time, so it is well worth it to do this extra step.

The recipe as a whole was amazing. From the moist, tasty meatballs filled with mozzarella cheese, to the simple, buttery Papparadelle. The meatballs call for several different kinds of meat and this adds complexity of the dish. The Oven Roasted Tomato Sauce is thick, sweet and tart at the same time and rich in a good way. The sauce is an excellent complement to the meatballs.

One thing I learned was to make the bread crumbs first because once the tomato sauce goes in the oven, the oven temperature will never be low enough for the bread crumbs.

This is also a good recipe to make ahead, since everything can be frozen and cooked another time. I can’t wait to make this recipe again.

Yum! Cheese! Meatballs! Genius! If you have a kitchenaid mixer, the grinder attachment works great. As the recipe states, these can also be frozen, and they still taste great. I served them with homemade papperdelle, but used a family recipe for the tomato sauce (Keller's oven roasted sause sounds simple and interesting though).

Keller's tip on making sure all the meat gets through the grinder is especially helpful and works (he suggests running a wad of plastic wrap through the ginder, holding on to one end, the wad works its way through the grinder pushing meat forward to the blade, but the blade suprisingly does not slice the plastic wrap).