Is is gravy or sauce? Either way, you'll never need another Italian Meat Sauce (or gravy) recipe ever again.
This easy Italian Meat Sauce is perfect when making Lasagna or Baked Ziti or whenever you just want to add a little meat to a Marinara sauce.
Need something to serve with Italian Meat Sauce? Try my Baked Rigatoni (Pasta al Forno) and Baked Italian Meatballs.
How do you make Italian Meat Sauce?
Let's get down to business.
You can't make an Italian Meat Sauce without onions, so let's first start by chopping some and adding them to some heated olive oil.
Once the onions cook for about five minutes, add some garlic. Now, you can either chop/mince the garlic and keep it in the pot throughout the entire cooking time or you can halve the garlic and remove it. It's up to you and there's no right or wrong way.
Cook for another minute.
Next comes the most important part of the sauce...the meat!
I add sweet ground sausage and ground beef to mine but the sky is the limit with what meat you want to add here. Short ribs, pork chops, veal, meatballs...you can't go wrong with any of it so enjoy!
Cook the meat until browned.
Once the meat is browned, add the crushed tomatoes, puree and a little water. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Add some fresh basil, cover and cook for at least 30 minutes. The longer you cook the sauce though, the more those flavors and juices release in the sauce. I typically cook mine for at least two hours. Today I cooked it for four!
Enjoy your family time with this Italian weekend staple!
Tools I used in this recipe:
- Lodge 7.5 Quart Dutch Oven
- Misen Chef's Knife
- J.K. Adams Butterfly Cutting Board
- Riveira Wooden Cooking Spoons
Recipe
Italian Meat Sauce (or Gravy)
Equipment
Ingredients
- 2 medium onions chopped
- 4 cloves garlic minced or halved
- 2 lb ground beef
- 2 lb Italian ground sausage hot or sweet
- 2 28 oz cans crushed tomatoes
- 1 28 oz can tomato puree
- 14 oz water
- 1 handful fresh basil chopped
- salt to taste
- black pepper to taste
Instructions
- Heat 3 tbsp of olive oil in a large Dutch oven or sauce pot. Once heated, add the chopped onions. Cook for about 5 minutes until they begin to soften.
- Add the garlic (you can either mince the garlic and leave it in the sauce during cooking, or you can halve the garlic and remove it after you cook it for about a minute with the onions).
- Add the ground beef and sausage. Break up and cook until browned.
- Add the canned crushed tomatoes, puree and water. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
- Add the chopped basil.
- Bring to a boil, then drop the heat, cover and simmer on low for at least 30 minutes but preferably at least 2 hours.
Notes
Nutrition
About The Skinny Guinea
Hey...how you doin'? I'm Tommy, The Skinny Guinea…just a busy dad who loves to cook. Offering easy to cook dinners and family friendly recipes, while always staying true to my Italian roots!
Can you use this as a spaghetti sauce I know it’s a silly question I’m just making sure LOL
You absolutely can...and I do use spaghetti quite often with this. Enjoy and let me know how it comes out!
Hi, do you eat the meat sauce by itself? I have read it will go great with the pasta noodles and spaghetti. Will this sauce be good to use when you make homemade pizza? Thank you!
Eating it by yourself...if you mean taking spoonfuls of it before or after I've had it on pasta...then YES! But it typically will go on a pasta and is not a standalone dish. You could use it for pizza if you absolutely had to, but it's a very thick sauce and you'll usually want something lighter to use with pizza as you don't want to weigh down the dough. Hope that helps and enjoy!
Looks awesome!!! When do you add the water?
Oops...sorry forgot the water. Add it with the tomatoes and puree. Enjoy!