Easiest Hands-Off Spaghetti & Meatballs

Sometimes you just need a win. There are some days so busy – so packed and fraught with THINGS – that you flounder and flobble (not a word) and grasp at straws and are desperately seeking a remedy for all of the chaos. For me, this tends to all come to a head – this feeling of overwhelm – right around dinner time, when I’m staring down the barrel of literal hours of potential cooking and cleaning (I solo-parent a lot at night and therefore I wear all the hats) and I find myself wanting to run all the way away. Far, far away. Or rather, to a fast food place that will sell me terrible things at very lovable prices. No no no. The guilt that will inevitably follow isn’t worth it. Flobble – flobble -flobble she goes …

And so. On days like this I have learned to give myself a pass and make dinner as easy breezy as I can. I say to myself, “Okay self. What can we do to turn things around here? How can we own this moment, rather than drown in it?” Enter these hands-off spaghetti and meatballs and their quick-fix brethren (I will share more things like this … so much more). Recipes like this are more than recipes – they are so easy, so wonderfully DOABLE and refreshingly simple – that they are solutions. They are keys to fixing those days that are just a little much. They will help you maintain control over your mealtime (no fast food!) and feel a sense of total satisfaction and productivity because you cooked something so awesome but you did it in such a short time that it didn’t add to your pile of busy. That’s the type of win I’m talking about, and I just love recipes like this on days like that.

Here, we’re going to put some spaghetti (I used whole wheat – yay fiber!) in a baking dish with our favorite store-bought marinara (go ahead and use homemade if you’ve got 3 cups of it squirreled away somewhere) and bake it along with some incredibly quick-fix meatballs nestled right on top. We’ll get some help from store-bought pesto with these meatballs, making them lightnight fast to put together. As the whole she-bang bakes away in the oven, the fat will render from those meatballs and drip into the marinara, creating a wonderful, luscious sauce that seems like maybe it shouldn’t be so easy. But it is. And that, my friends, is a beautiful thing.

Do I have long, lingering Sunday supper types of spaghetti recipes in my arsenal? Course I do; my Great Italian Nonna and Italian-American aunties have gifted me with some pretty great balls n’ sauce skills (we call it sugo). But not on a busy, flobbly, just-keeping-my-head-above-water Tuesday. No, that’s when this recipe becomes my pinch hitter. And I hope she becomes yours too.

Easiest Hands-Off Spaghetti & Meatballs

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The fastest, easiest way to enjoy homemade(ish) spaghetti and meatballs that we know. By cooking the noodles right in the sauce in the baking dish, you get a brilliant one-pan meal that will make everyone smile when you set it on the table. Juicy, flavorful meatballs get a fast-tracked boost from store-bought pesto, and come together in a snap, baking right along with the noodles in this cozy, easy-as-pie dinner. If you want to make it even faster – just use store-bought meatballs from your grocery store’s meat department (not frozen). (inspired by America’s Test Kitchen)

• Author: My Kitchen Little
• Prep Time: 5 minutes
• Cook Time: 35
• Total Time: 40 minutes
• Yield: 4 servings 1x
• Method: Baking
• Cuisine: Italian

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

12 oz spaghetti, broken in half

1 (24-oz) jar of good quality marinara sauce (or use 24 oz homemade, if you have it)

1 lb. ground beef (80/20)

3/4 cup panko bread crumbs (you can use Italian-style instead, if you like)

1/2 cup store-bought (or homemade pesto)

Salt and pepper, as needed

Fresh chopped basil, for garnish

Grated parmesan, for sprinkling (optional)

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Instructions

Set your oven rack to the middle position and preheat to 475 degrees F. Spray a large (13 x 9-inch) baking dish with non-stick spray. 

Spread the spaghetti in the dish and cover with the sauce. Add 2 cups water and toss to ensure the pasta is coated. 

In a large bowl, using your hands, combine the beef, panko, and pesto and season with about 1 tsp salt and some freshly cracked black pepper. Don’t overwork! Pinch off and roll the meat mixture into balls, about 1.5 inches in size. You should get 13 to 15 meatballs. Place these meatballs on top of the pasta in the dish, cover with aluminum foil, and bake for 30 minutes.

After 30 minutes, remove the foil and give the pasta a good stir all over, loosening it and mixing it gently. Bake 5 to 7 more minutes, until the pasta is cooked through. Add a bit of extra water to the dish and stir if it seems a bit drier than you’d prefer. Serve with fresh basil and a sprinkle of grated parm on top.