Meatballs are one of my favorite and most versatile things to have in the freezer. There are so many options for them! From the obvious Spaghetti and Meatballs to the lesser-known Meatball Casserole and even those manly options like Meatball Subs!
But finding a good recipe for a meatball and sauce that can be used in ALL of these ways is sometimes hard. So after much trial and error, I created my own! This is a perfect crock pot recipe, as it takes a while to cook and gets better the longer the flavors have to meld together. I hope you enjoy it, as it has been a BIG hit in our household lately.
- 1 lb ground beef
- 1 lb pork sausage
- 2 Tbsp tomato ketchup
- 15 cloves of roasted garlic
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 C rolled oats
- 1/2 C corn meal
- 2 tsp cayenne pepper
- 3 x 15 oz cans of tomato sauce
- 2 x 4 oz cans of mushroom pieces (don’t drain)
- 2 Tbsp brown sugar
- 2 tsp black pepper
- 1 Tbsp kosher salt
- 1 medium white onion, chopped
- In a bowl, mix the sausage and ground beef together with your hands or a wooden spoon until well combined.
- Take 3-4 garlic cloves and chop them into the meat mixture.
- Crack in two eggs to the mixture and stir.
- Add in the ketchup, rolled oats and corn meal and combine well. If the mixture seems too thin, add a bit more corn meal until the meat is a nice thick texture.
- Using your hands, take a small amount of the meat mixture and roll into a ball. For more meatballs, use less meat, and for larger meatballs, use more meat.
- Set the meatballs aside on a cookie sheet until you are ready for them.
- In the crock pot, add in one of the cans of tomato sauce to cover the bottom of the pot.
- Next, layer 6 -7 meatballs on top of this (use more meatballs if you’ve made them smaller).
- Top this layer with one can of the mushrooms.
- Add on top of this about half of the chopped onion.
- Add on top of this a few cloves of chopped garlic.
- Add another can of the tomato sauce.
- Continue layering meatballs, mushrooms, onions, garlic and sauce until you’ve used them all.
- Turn the crock pot on high and leave to cook for about 3 hours.
- After 3 hours or so, the meatballs should be safe to stir without worrying about breaking them. Give the whole pot a good stir to combine all of the elements.
- Add in the salt, pepper, cayenne pepper and brown sugar at this point and then stir again.
- Leave to cook for another 2 hours before stirring again.
- At this point, the meatballs should be cooked through and ready to eat, however the longer you leave them, the better it tastes.
This recipe yields quite a large amount of meatballs, and they (and the sauce) freeze really well. I now have made several meals out of them, and I still have 4 – 5 servings in the freezer, as well as 2 – 3 pots of sauce that I will be able to use for other pasta dishes!
I hope you enjoy, and do let me know if you try it yourself! :)
I'm a 31 year old stay at home mother, crafter, domestic goddess and blogger from Kissimmee, FL. 
Thank you for following me, I followed back ;-). I must say I just ate but those look delish! The whole thing looks delicious! I am going to try and cook this. I need to start being more of a cook instead of my fiance, or at least double team it, haha. Even the toast looks yum!
Brook recently posted..This and that
Aw, thanks for stopping by, Brook. I can tell you for sure that these meatballs are really really yummy. And the toast wasn’t bad either!! ;) Thanks for stopping by!