A few weeks back I posted a recipe for my version of tomato sauce using Jersey tomatoes.  At the same time, one of our neighbors posted something on Facebook that she and her husband and extended family were all making large amounts of sauce.  I was interested and commented about it and then that afternoon they came over with a freshly pressed jar of their family recipe for tomato sauce.  I was very excited to receive the sauce as I thought it was very cool that a family has a tradition of making sauce and preserving the vegetables of summer together.  So, I was excited to try it and as such, I used that sauce for this dish…it was very tasty btw.  However, if you made the sauce from a few weeks ago, you can certainly use that or simply take a good quality can of tomatoes and crush them and simmer them slowly over a low flame with some garlic, olive oil, salt, basil, and red pepper flake and you will have a great sauce in a matter of minutes.  Either way, you will need about a quart or so of tomato sauce as the meatballs are sort of braised for about a half hour or so in the sauce.

Also, in the pizza extravaganza post, I outlined a general recipe for making your own Italian sausage.  I used this recipe for the start of the Italian sausage meatballs.  If you don’t wish to make your own sausage per that recipe, you can certainly use store bought Italian sausage…just take the meat out of the casings and combine it all together with the rest of the ingredients and go from there.

Broccoli rabe is one of my more favorite vegetables.  It’s delicate yet firm and has a bit of a bitter taste.  I flash cooked it in a bit of water first and then added it to the sauce at the very end to finish.

You can go a number of different ways with the dish from here.  I simply served it with a bit of bread and we ate it as is.  However, tossing the sauce with some pasta would be great and it certainly would make a great Italian sandwich with a few roasted peppers and possibly some provolone cheese on a toasted piece of Italian bread or a bun.  Actually you could also make a pizza out of it too though the sauce would need to be thickened more than is pictured.  At any rate, I think you can see that there are a lot of options for this versatile dish.

As for the tomato sauce itself that I used here…thanks again (you know who you are).  I have your jar ready to roll; I simply haven’t gotten it back to you but will do so soon.

I hope you enjoy this dish as much as my wife and I did!  Recipe follows after the jump… Continue reading →