Meatball Sliders

This dish is a great recipe to make double the meat part so you can freeze it. Then for those nights that you just don't have time to cook, all you have to do is pull out some of the already cooked meatballs, thaw them, then you have half the work already done.

This recipe was adapted from Annie's eats: Mini Meatball sliders with basil pesto

Meatball Sliders

yields 20 sliders

For the sauce:

2 jars spaghetti sauce (approximately 56 oz)

   Optional: If your spaghetti sauce is on the *plain* side you will want to spruce it up with some onion, garlic, basil, oregano, parsley, and some sugar.

Water

For the meatballs:

1/2 cup breadcrumbs

1/4 cup milk

1lb. ground beef pr ground turkey

1 egg

1 clove garlic, minced

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

1 tsp dried parsley

1/2 tsp dried basil

For the pesto:

1 jar of Classico-Traditional Basil Pesto

or Annies's eats recipe for pesto

For the sliders:

24 dinner rolls

Olive oil spray

12 slices provolone cheese

Directions:

1)To make meatballs, combine 1/4 cup of breadcrumbs and milk in a medium bowl and let rest 10 min. Then add remaining breadcrumbs, ground meat, egg, garlic, salt, pepper, parsley, and basil into bowl. Roll meatballs into 1 1/4 in diameter. 

2) Bake meatballs at 375 degrees for 25min or until cooked through. 

3) In a large deep saute pan, saute onion and garlic in butter or live oil until onions are translucent. Add in spices.Pour in jar sauce and add water to thin down sauce to your liking. Bring to a boil then simmer.

4) Add meatballs to sauce and let simmer 30 min.
    *If making enough to freeze some for later then this is where you will remove that amount and let cool down on jelly roll pan and then freeze.

5) Preheat oven to 400 degrees. To assemble sliders, lay rolls open and spray lightly with olive oil. Bake in oven for 5 min or until lightly toasted. Slice a cooked meatball in half and lay both halves down on bottom roll.  Spoon small amount of sauce over meatballs. Top with cheese. (leave the top of the roll off) Bake another 5 min. Then spoon pesto on top of cheese and some spaghetti sauce. Top with top of roll.