Keeping It Simple Italian

  • Recipes
  • About
  • My CookBooks!
menu icon
go to homepage
  • Recipes
  • About
  • My CookBooks!
subscribe
search icon
Homepage link
  • Recipes
  • About
  • My CookBooks!
×
Home » Recipes » Italian American Dinner Recipes

Mini Meatballs With Roasted Peppers And Tomato Sauce

by kisitalian, Aug 12, 2024 updated Aug 12, 2024

Jump to Recipe

Try out this delicious mini meatballs recipe with roasted red peppers and tomato sauce for a tasty twist on a classic dish. These mini Italian meatballs cook up fast and are so delicious thanks to the really easy roasted red pepper and tomato sauce. Perfect for a family dinner or as an appetizer at a party!

Mini meatballs with sauce and red peppers in a large pan with a spoon in it and salt and pepper in the background.

My family loves this mini meatball recipe and I make it often since the mini meatballs quick up very quickly. If I do not have time for my slow cooker polpette, I am making this instead.

All of the cooking is done on the stovetop and the sauce for the meatballs, made up of roasted red peppers, tomato sauce, fresh basil, and garlic is light and compliments the meatballs perfectly.

You can pull off a delicious meatball dinner during the week with this recipe. Even though this is super easy to make for dinner, I will often make this dish in the afternoon if I have extra time and then reheat everything later on for dinner. It is such an amazing meal and I know you will love this as much as I do once you try it.

What You'll Need

Ingredients for mini meatballs and sauce including: ground beef, tomato sauce, basil, garlic, olive oil, breadcrumbs, egg, a jar of roasted red peppers, and salt.
  • Jar Of Roasted Red Bell Peppers
  • Tomato Sauce: You can also use Passata
  • Ground Beef: I like to use an 85 % lean ground beef
  • Italian Bread Crumbs: You can also use plain bread crumbs.
  • Egg
  • Fresh basil
  • Fresh garlic cloves
  • Kosher salt

How To Make Mini Meatballs With Roasted Peppers and Tomato Sauce

The steps are really easy for this one. If you can, have someone help you roll the meatballs to make it even faster!

The first steps of making the meatballs from mixing the meatball ingredients to rolling them then adding them to a hot pan with olive oil.
  • Make the mini meatballs: Add the ground meat, breadcrumbs, garlic, and basil to a large mixing bowl and mix well. Now add the egg and mix that in until well combined. Once the mixture is well combined, take a large tablespoon full of the meat and roll it into mini meatballs. Keep doing this until all the meat is used up.
  • Cook the meatballs: Preheat a large skillet over medium heat with olive oil. Once preheated, add the meatballs and cook until browned on all sides. You will need to turn the meatballs after 2 minutes to brown all sides. When cooked, turn off the heat and cover.
Browning the meatballs in a pan then turning off the heat and covering them and mixing the red pepper and tomato sauce in a separate pan.
  • Make the roasted red pepper and tomato sauce: In a medium saucepan on the stovetop, add garlic and saute for 1-2 minutes. Then add the tomato sauce and roasted red peppers. Mix well, add salt then reduce heat to low to a simmer for about 5 minutes.
Pouring the red pepper and tomato sauce over the meatballs in a pan, mixing them together then simmering for 5 minutes.
  • Combine: Once the red pepper and tomato sauce is finished simmering, add the sauce to the meatballs then mix well to coat them in the sauce. Allow the meatballs to cook in the sauce on low heat for about 5 minutes.
  • Enjoy!

How many mini meatballs per pound of ground beef?

I use one pound of ground beef for this recipe and it yields about 24 meatballs. This also serves about 5-6 meatballs per person.

If you are serving more people or want leftovers, you can certainly, and very easily double the recipe. You may need to cook the meatballs in batches!

Variations

I love giving ideas on how to change things up because Italian cooking is all about using what you have on hand and what is fresh. Here are some ideas for this:

  • Use fresh garden tomatoes: Instead of the tomato sauce, if you have fresh tomatoes, dice those up and cook them down with the red peppers.
  • Use stale bread instead of breadcrumbs: If I have stale bread in the house, I love throwing that into a food processor and mixing it until it resembles fine bread crumbs and using that for the meatballs. So good!
  • Add in more veggies to the sauce: Just like the roasted red peppers that are left whole in the sauce, you can saute up some zucchini or maybe another veggie and then add that to the sauce.
  • Change up the sauce: if you prefer a more authentic Italian meatball experience, make an authentic Italian marinara sauce to go with it.

Storing And Reheating

This is such a great dish for making ahead of time.

Storing: To store these meatballs, allow it to cool almost all the way then place it in a container with a lid and refrigerate for up to 3 days. You can also freeze the meatballs and sauce instead of refrigerating. It will last in the freezer for up to 2 months.

Reheating: To reheat, pour the meatballs and sauce into a medium saucepan then heat on low heat covered for about 10-15 minutes. Make sure to stir often. You may need to add a little water to the pan during the reheating.

Keeping warm in a slow cooker: If I am entertaining, I will reheat the meatballs (if I make them ahead of time) and then place them into a slow cooker set to warm. It will stay warm and ready to eat this way for a few hours. You can also add them straight into the slow cooker right after the dish is made. Just make sure they are very hot when you add them to the slow cooker to keep them warm for any duration.

What To Serve With These Mini Meatballs

We often eat this dish on its own but sometimes we add a side or main to go with it. Here are my favorites:

  • angle hair pasta with tomatoes
    Angel Hair Pasta with Tomatoes
  • creamy instant polenta in a pot with a whisk
    How To Make Polenta: Easy And Quick Creamy Polenta
  • Italian fried eggplant 2
    Italian Fried Eggplant Without Flour
  • ciabatta garlic bread
    The Best Ciabatta Garlic Bread
Mini meatballs with sauce and red peppers in a large pan with a spoon in it and salt and pepper in the background.

Mini Meatballs With Roasted Peppers And Tomato Sauce

Melissa
Try out this delicious mini meatballs recipe with roasted red peppers and tomato sauce for a tasty twist on a classic dish. These mini Italian meatballs cook up fast and are so delicious thanks to the really easy roasted red pepper and tomato sauce. Perfect for a family dinner or as an appetizer at a party!
5 from 1 vote
Print Recipe Pin Recipe
Prep Time 10 minutes mins
Cook Time 30 minutes mins
Total Time 40 minutes mins
Course dinner, entertaining, Main Course
Cuisine Italian
Servings 24 mini meatballs
Calories 88 kcal

Ingredients
  

  • 15 ounces tomato sauce
  • 13 ounces jarred Roasted Red Peppers course chopped
  • 1 lb ground beef 85% Lean
  • 1 cup Italian breadcrumbs
  • ½ cup fresh basil divided
  • 1 large egg
  • 4 cloves garlic minced
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt divided
  • 2 tablespoon olive oil divided

Instructions
 

  • In a large bowl, add ground beef, bread crumbs, ½ of the garlic, ½ of the basil, and ½ teaspoon of kosher salt. Mix well until combined. Then add the egg and mix well.
    1 lb ground beef, 1 cup Italian breadcrumbs, ½ cup fresh basil, 4 cloves garlic, 1 teaspoon kosher salt, 1 large egg
  • Grab a heaping tablespoon of the ground meat mixture and roll it into a mini meatball then place onto a plate. repeat this until all of the meat is used.
  • Preheat a large skillet over medium heat.
  • Add 1 tablespoon olive oil then place meatballs in the skillet and cook for about minutes or so per side until the meatballs are browned on all sides.
  • Once cooked, turn off the heat and cover with a lid.
  • In a medium saucepan, add 1 tablespoon olive oil and garlic and cook for 1 minute.
    4 cloves garlic
  • Now add the red peppers and tomato sauce and mix well.
    13 ounces jarred Roasted Red Peppers, 15 ounces tomato sauce
  • Reduce heat to low and simmer for 5 minutes.
  • After 5 minutes, pour the sauce over the meatballs in the large pan and mix well making sure to coat the meatballs in the sauce.
  • Gently simmer on low for 5 minutes.
  • Serve immediately.

Nutrition

Calories: 88kcalCarbohydrates: 5gProtein: 5gFat: 6gSaturated Fat: 2gPolyunsaturated Fat: 0.4gMonounsaturated Fat: 3gTrans Fat: 0.2gCholesterol: 20mgSodium: 473mgPotassium: 144mgFiber: 1gSugar: 1gVitamin A: 203IUVitamin C: 9mgCalcium: 24mgIron: 1mg
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!

Comments

    5 from 1 vote

    Leave a Reply Cancel reply

    Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

    Recipe Rating




    This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

  1. Emily says

    August 22, 2024 at 10:06 pm

    5 stars
    My family loved this!

    Reply
    • kisitalian says

      August 23, 2024 at 4:01 pm

      So glad to hear that 🙂

      Reply
Making tagliatelle for ragu alla Bolognese.

Welcome to Keeping It Simple Italian!

I love to share easy Italian recipes. From easy Italian recipes from Italy to Italian American recipes brought over and adapted by Italian immigrants. read more:

Footer

↑ back to top

Privacy Policy

Accessibility

Subscribe

Copyright © 2020 KeepingItSimpleItalian

Rate This Recipe

Your vote:




In order to protect the integrity of our reviews, and user trust, we require everyone to leave a comment with their rating. Thank you!

Let us know what you thought of this recipe:

This worked exactly as written, thanks!
My family loved this!
Thank you for sharing this recipe

Or write in your own words:

A rating is required
A name is required
An email is required

Recipe Ratings without Comment

Something went wrong. Please try again.