Easy Homemade Spaghetti Sauce

This easy, homemade spaghetti sauce is easily the recipe I make more than any other in our house. When you don’t know what you feel like eating, for some reason pasta and red sauce always hits the spot!

This is the sauce I use for lasagna, chicken parmesan, ziti….pretty much everything! The best part of this recipe is the fact that it takes less than 10 minutes of prep time. You can’t beat that!

This sauce is most often accompanied by my meatballs. But sometimes you just don’t feel like doing too much work. On nights like that, I admit it, I head to the frozen meatballs. And truth be told, they usually just do the job. Even with homemade sauce, frozen meatballs tend to leave me disappointed. So, when Johnsonville contacted me to see if I would like to try their meatballs, I was skeptical.

Johnsonville Three Cheese Italian Style Meatballs are made with Johnsonville quality pork, and you can taste it! As soon as you bite into one of the meatballs, you get that Johnsonville sausage taste we all know and love. I was pleasantly surprised by these meatballs. Instead of the fake meat and chemical taste that frozen meatballs usually have, these you may even be able to pass off as homemade!

I cooked the meatballs in my homemade sauce, to make sure we weren’t eating a completely “fast food” meal. This was definitely a winning decision, and Johnsonville will definitely be the meatballs I keep in my freezer for those lazy nights moving ahead. My one word of warning: These meatballs are NOT great for the waistline. At 100 calories and about 9 grams of fat PER 1″ MEATBALL, you might want to keep track of how many you are eating.

Easy Homemade Spaghetti Sauce Recipe

Ingredients

• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 large garlic clove (diced)
• ½ small Vidalia onion (diced)
• 4 Campari tomatoes (diced) OR 14 oz can diced tomato
• 28 oz pureed tomatoes
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• ½ tsp onion powder
• ½ tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp sugar
• Pinch of cinnamon (Seriously, a small pinch. You want this to be an accent, not an overwhelming flavor)
• Crushed red pepper (optional, to taste)
• ½ tsp salt (plus more to taste)

Directions

• Place olive oil and chopped garlic in a medium sauce pan, do not turn heat on yet
• Using a wooden spoon, rub garlic around pot
• Turn heat onto medium – high
• When garlic begins to sizzle, add diced onions
• When onions begin to sizzle, add diced tomatoes
• When tomatoes begin to boil, add the pureed tomatoes
• Stir well and bring to a boil
• Add oregano, onion powder, garlic powder and sugar
• Add PINCH of cinnamon. I am serious when I say a small pinch. Pinch the cinnamon into your hand first so you make sure not to add too much.
• Add crushed red pepper to taste
• Add salt to taste
• Return the sauce to a boil, reduce heat to a low simmer
• (Optional step) Add your meatballs or sausage
• Allow sauce to simmer for at least 15 minutes (30 if you added meat)
• Serve over your favorite pasta, pizza, rice….whatever you like!

Happy Eating!
–  Renee Hirschberg