As Promised...Mini Meatball Sandwiches

A day late but here is the main course we had with the picked from the garden cucumbers!  When I first saw this recipe on the Pioneer Woman's website, it brought back a memory of going to an Italian festival of sorts in South St. Louis when I was about 19.  I was invited into a local Italian family's kitchen and there on the stove was simmering a huge pot of meatballs. Everyone was just loading these meatballs up on hoagie bread and was it ever delicious!  This thought caused me to go in that direction with this recipe.

They didn't photograph great, but were wonderful all the same!  I'm still working on this food photography stuff, so thanks for bearing with me!

Jim and Jack loved them and I hope you do as well!  I'll let you know up front that the only changes I made with this recipe was to add Italian Seasoning to the meatball mixture and to use little mini loaf breads instead of dollar rolls.

Gather your ingredients....

In a large bowl, put in your ground beef, bread crumbs, garlic, Italian Seasoning, salt, pepper and milk

Mix that all together until it is well blended then form into small little meatballs, heaping tablespoon sized

Next, chop your onion up small and put it in the pan with the olive oil heated over medium heat, cook for about a minute.

Here is where I detoured from the original recipe. I put all the meatballs in the pan at once to cook.
I didn't see any reason to cook them a few at a time and they turned out fine.

When the meatballs are done, add your can/jar of Marinara sauce.  I never buy prepared sauce but I happened to
pick up 2 cans for $3 recently and since I wanted this to be fast and easy, that's what I went with.

Being careful while stirring the sauce so as not to break up your meatballs, then cover and simmer for about 20 minutes.

While the meatballs were simmering, I put the rolls in the over for a few minutes just to toast them
up a bit and then sliced them in half.

Cut your provolone into pieces that will fit your bread, putting one slice on the bottom and another on top of your meatballs.
You can put one meatball or two on each sandwich, depending on just how messy you want to get while eating.
Just to forewarn you, these were very messy!

So there you go! Simple, fast and yummy (all be it MESSY) summertime dinner!

Recipe: Mini Meatball Sandwiches

Ingredients

• 1 pound Ground Chuck Or Ground Beef


• ½ cups Panko Or Other Bread Crumbs


• 1 clove Garlic, Minced


• ½ teaspoons Salt


• Freshly Ground Black Pepper


• ½ cups Milk


• 2 Tablespoons Olive Oil


• ½ whole Medium Onion, Diced


• 1 jar (large) Marinara Sauce


• 12 whole Dinner Rolls


• 4 slices Provolone Cheese, Cut Into Four Wedges Each

Instructions

1. Mix meat with bread crumbs, garlic, salt, pepper, and milk.


2. Knead together with hands.


3. Roll into heaping tablespoon-sized rolls.


4. Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add onions and cook for one minute.


5. Add meatballs between the onions and brown for one minute. (You might have to do this in two batches, depending on the size of your skillet.)


6. Pour in jar of marinara; shake pan gently to mix. Put on lid and allow to simmer for 20 minutes.


7. When ready to serve, cut each dinner roll in half. Place a wedge of Provolone on the top and bottom of each roll. Spoon a meatball with the sauce onto the bottom bun; top with the top bun.

Quick Notes

I added 1 Tbs. of Italian Seasoning and used Italian rolls. I cooked the meatballs all at once using the whole pan, and they turned out fine.

Microformatting by hRecipe.