I have really been in a cooking rut lately—it feels like I’m making the same dishes on repeat. When I came across the Soutzoukakia (or Greek baked meatballs) from The Mediterranean Dish, I was super excited. Pasta and meatballs are a staple around here (although I recently made The Pollan Family Table‘s amazing bolognese and did not regret it one bit), so I could use a familiar recipe but change up the seasoning and presentation.
I used to love making my own tomato sauce from scratch, so this was the inspiration I needed to create Suzy’s version with different spices than my usual oregano, fennel, and basil.
I started with my basic meatball recipe, which uses 1 pound of ground beef instead of 1 1/2 pounds in Suzy’s dish. To pair with that reduced amount, I used only one slice of bread and one egg; if you make her original recipe, you probably want to keep those measurements. I also used dried minced onion, about 1 tablespoon, because I’m lazy and my kids prefer that to the texture of chopped fresh onion in their meatballs.
Otherwise I followed the seasoning to the letter: fresh garlic, cumin, cinnamon, oregano, and fresh parsley. I used 1 teaspoon sea salt and some generous grinds of black pepper, and voila! Meatball batter.
I also made Suzy’s tomato sauce pretty much exactly the way it was written—but I had to add some more dried oregano, dried basil, and olives! I chopped 10-12 each castelvetrano and black olives in half and added them into the sauce at the very end, along with 1 1/2 teaspoons of salt total.
Then, instead of baking the meatballs, I just added them into the saucepan, reserving five to cook in olive oil for my oldest son who hates tomato sauce. He gobbled these up despite the different spice profile, so these were a hit on multiple levels.
While I simmered the meatballs on the stove for about 15-20 minutes, turning several times, I cooked some casarecce and half a bag of penne pasta and spread it in a 9×13 casserole. When the meatballs were cooked, I added them on top of the pasta and spread the sauce around, and then topped it all with slices of fresh mozzarella. Into the oven at 400 for 10 minutes and you have yourself a really awesome Greek meatball pasta bake.
I served it with broccoli rabe and spiralized zucchini sautéed in garlic and olive oil, but even better would be the Not Your Mama’s Beet Salad I made the night before. As usual most of my salads are born of things I already have, which I know makes me sound like I’m humble bragging, so I apologize for pointing out how obnoxiously spontaneously artistic I am when it comes to salads.
In all seriousness, though, this is one of the benefits to cooking like I do—you develop something of an instinct for what will go well together without having to go out and shop specially. Also please keep in mind that we had JUST gone to Costco so I had lots of options in the house, and also there are way more times than I like to admit when I throw out fresh produce that I’ve let sit because I am lazy and not inspired at all.
Now that we hopefully all have a good understanding of my strengths and weaknesses, here is my tweaked version of The Mediterranean Dish’s delicious and inspiring Soutzoukakia.
Greek Meatball Pasta Bake
Ingredients
Meatballs
- 1 slice white bread
- 1/3 cup whole milk
- 1 Tbsp dried minced onion
- 3 cloves garlic minced
- 1 egg
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
- 1 tsp sea salt
- 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
- 1 lb grass-fed ground beef or lamb
Homemade Sauce
- 1-2 Tbsp olive oil
- 3 cloves garlic minced
- 1/2 cup red wine
- 1 26-28-oz container strained tomatoes
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp dried basil
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- 1 tsp sugar
- 1 1/2 tsp sea salt
- 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
- 10-12 each castelvetrano and black olives halved
To Assemble
- 16-18 oz dry pasta such as penne
- 6 oz fresh mozzarella sliced
- parsley for serving
Instructions
- Prehead oven to 400 degrees. In a large bowl, add bread and milk and let soak a few minutes. Add remainingin igredients and mix with hands, then form into meatballs. In a large stockpot, bring salted water to a boil.
- In a large dutch oven or saute pan, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring, 5 minutes. Add garlic and cook for 1-2 more minutes. Add red wine and cook until reduced by half. Add remaining ingredients and stir to combine.
- Add meatballs to sauce (meatballs should be mostly submerged) and cook 3 minutes, then turn over and cover. Cook 15 minutes, turning meatballs at least once more.
- While meatballs and sauce are cooking, cook pasta in boiling salted water according to package directions, about 11 minutes for penne. Drain pasta and toss with olive oil.
- Spread pasta in a 9×13 casserole dish. Pour sauce with meatballs over top and distribute evenly, gently stirring into the top layer of pasta. Top with mozzarella slices. Bake in oven for 10 minutes. Top with parsley and serve.
[…] As discussed in a previous post, I generally make salads based on what I already have in the house rather than going out specifically to shop for them. They’re a clean-out-the-fridge kind of dish, like soup. Of course, it helps when you’ve just gone to the grocery store. It’s all in the timing. But still, there are those little odds and ends you want to use up to make room for all the food you just spent too much money on. […]