One Pot Spaghetti And Meatballs
This easy recipe for one pot spaghetti and meatballs cooks all together in one skillet. More flavor and less clean-up – how’s that for a suppertime winner?
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❤️ Why we love this recipe
Who doesn’t LOVE spaghetti and meatballs? But they are such a production, right? Browning the meatballs, warming the sauce, boiling the pasta…it takes every pot in the house. Right?
Actually…nope! This easy peasy recipe for one pot spaghetti and meatballs makes a fabuloso spaghetti and meatballs, but here is the beauty part…all in that one skillet.
And, because everything is cooking up together, the spaghetti soaks up a lot of the gorgeous sauce and meatball flavor, so instead of one sitting on top of the other, all three components are beautifully, harmoniously, delectably, delightfully intermingled.
Sounds too good to be true, right? But it IS! And I am here to tell you how to do it, without overloading your dishwasher on top of everything else. Here comes the 411 on my favorite one pot spaghetti recipe.
🍅 Ingredients you need
📝 Ingredient notes and substitutions
- Ground beef: We recommend the 80/20 fat variety, but you can use any ground beef you like. (Or ground turkey!)
- Marinara Sauce: We love Rao’s Marinara sauce, but use your fave. Or if you have some extra time, make your own marinara sauce.
See the recipe card for full information on ingredients and quantities and nutritional information.
👩🏻🍳 How to make this recipe
STEP 1: Make your meatball mixture by combining breadcrumbs, milk, beef, Paremsan, egg, oregano and a pinch of salt and pepper.
STEP 2: Now roll up your meatballs. I like using a tablespoon size cookie scoop for this part (and this is also a great way to get the kiddos involved in making supper).
STEP 3: Cook your meatballs over medium high heat in olive oil for just a few minutes in a large deep skillet or Dutch oven just to quickly brown the outside. You want a nice dark brown sear on one side, and then turn them over with tongs to quickly firm up the other side.
STEP 4: Take the meatballs out and let them lounge around for a few minutes while you add some of your favorite tomato sauce, some water and some spaghetti to that same skillet. Turn up the heat, cover the pot and let it bubble away.
Pro Tip: Run a small spatula under each meatball to loosen it up before you turn it over.
STEP 5: When the pasta is halfway done (half the time of the cooking time on the pasta box), you nestle those happy little meatballs into the spaghetti for the second half of the pasta cooking time, and this will give them enough time to cook up into tender perfection.
Taste your pasta to make sure it’s tender enough…if not, just keep it bubbling away until it is done the way you like it.
STEP 6: Serve it up and rejoice at the fact that there is exactly one pan to clean!
🧐 Recipe FAQs
I love this trick! Put your spaghetti in the middle of a clean dishtowel. Roll it up, and then grasp the towel with both hands and break the spaghetti inside the towel. Voila! Perfectly broken in half pasta. Oh, and these days you can sometimes find broken-in-half pasta in the pasta aisle.
You sure can! Use the directions on the box to adjust the cooking time – different pastas will need different amounts of time to get to al dente perfection. Denser pastas might also need to you add a little hot water towards the end of the cooking time if things are not looking saucy enough.
If I am in a rush, I grab the handy jar of Rao’s marinara sauce that I always have in my pantry for Pasta Emergencies. But if I have time, I make my favorite homemade kind, which I modestly call The Best Tomato Sauce In The World. If you try this (and please try it!) you want to puree it so it is nice and liquidly.
Panko crumbs are bread crumbs that have been dried and flaked, and they tend to give a lighter texture to your meatballs than fresh breadcrumbs. But if you have regular dried bread crumbs, those work too!
Leave it for me in the comments below, and I promise to answer pronto!
So there you have it: perfectly cooked pasta and meatballs that are delightfully infused with tomato sauce. And one pot to clean!
🥣 Equipment we used for this recipe
These are some of my favorite kitchen tools! These are Amazon affiliate links, which means I get a little something if you buy through my links at no extra cost to you. (Which helps pay for all that bacon I keep buying! 😄) And I only share things I use and love. I’m so grateful for your support!
- Measuring Cup: We love these angled cups that show the measurements on both the inside and outside of the cup.
- Cutting Board: These sturdy, dishwasher-safe cutting boards come in all different sizes.
- Cheese Grater: My dad found this one after testing millions of them, and it is the best grater we’ve ever used.
- Cookie Scoop: This scoop makes meat-ball-making so much easier…and it’s also great for these flavor-packed rum raisin cookies.
- Dutch Oven: This sturdy all-purpose pot is spendy, but we literally use it so much that it never leaves our stovetop.
- Measuring Spoons: These handy magnetic spoons are not on a ring, so you can just pick the one you need.
- Pyrex Mixing Bowls: These classic sturdy bowls come in all different sizes and are great for everything from mixing ingredients to being casual serving bowls.
🍽️ What to serve with this recipe
This one pot spaghetti recipe is definitely a meal all by itself, but if you like a salad on the side, this wedge salad recipe has our whole heart. Want to go a little simpler with the veggies? You can’t go wrong with this green bean and cherry tomato salad. Or a regular tossed salad with this bacon vinaigrette.
And of course we need dessert! How about some rum raisin oatmeal cookies? They are awesome cookie ice cream sandwiches if you pop a little ice cream in between two cookies.
😍 Other one pot recipes we love!
🤔 We want to know what you think!
If you try this recipe, we would love to hear how it came out for you! I’d be super grateful if you could leave a star rating (you pick how many stars! 🌟 ) and your thoughts in the Comments section below the recipe card.
One Pot Spaghetti
This easy recipe for one pot spaghetti and meatballs cooks all together in one skillet. More flavor and less clean-up – how’s that for a suppertime winner?
- Prep Time: 20 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Total Time: 40 minutes
- Yield: 4 1x
- Category: Dinner
- Method: Stovetop
- Cuisine: Italian
Ingredients
- ½ cup panko bread crumbs
- 1/4 cup milk
- 1 pound ground beef
- 1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese, plus more for garnish
- 1 egg
- 1 teaspoon oregano
- Salt and pepper
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 3 cups of your favorite marinara sauce
- 2 cups water
- 8 ounces spaghetti, broken in half
- Chopped fresh basil for garnish
Instructions
- Put the bread crumbs, milk, beef, Parmesan, egg and oregano in a mixing bowl and add a pinch of salt and pepper. Mix it all up until just combined.
- Form into meatballs, using about 2 tablespoons of meat mixture per meatball (a cookie scoop works wonderfully for this.
- Heat oil in a large deep skillet over high heat. Sear meatballs on one side for one minute until they are nicely browned on one side, about 2-3 minutes. Turn meatballs over to cook very briefly on the other side and transfer to a plate lined with paper towel.
- Add the sauce and the water to that same skillet, add pasta and turn heat to medium high. Cover and cook for 8 minutes, stirring every couple of minutes..
- Now nestle the meatballs into spaghetti, browned side up. Reduce the heat to medium low, cover up the skillet and cook for 4 more minutes, stirring from time to time.
- Uncover and cook for 4 more minutes or until spaghetti is done, stirring gently from time to time.
- Divide among bowls and sprinkle with basil and more Parmesan cheese. Realize there is only one skillet to wash. Feel very happy.
Notes
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- Panko Crumbs: These light dried bread crumbs are usually either in the international aisle or the pasta aisle. They have a great light texture that is perfect for the meatballs. If you have regular dried breadcrumbs on hand, they will work too!
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- Ground Beef: As always, we go for the 80/20 fat content version…more flavor that way
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- Marinara Sauce: We usually go for the jarred version of this tomato pasta sauce (and honestly? We like the store version (in our case, Rao’s) just fine! If you are feeling energetic, you can also make your own – here’s our choice for the best tomato sauce recipe in the world!