Moni’s Meat Sauce

Hi Everyone! I hope you guys had an AMAZING week and Valentines Day! Brendan and I had the most perfect night on Thursday – we decided to cook dinner at home this year and made my Moni’s Meat Sauce! 

Moni’s Meat Sauce (#branding) is buttery and delicious; this sauce is packed with flavor and filled with mouth-watering sausage and ground beef in every bite. It’s the perfect way to impress your significant other the next time you’re cooking at home ;). 

Making Moni’s Meat Sauce does NOT have to be intimidating 

Take it from someone who knows… I have tried making so many pasta sauces from scratch. After many hours at the stove and many less-than-spectacular sauces, I thought to myself “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Companies like Prego and Classico have stayed in business because their sauces are BOMB – why not start with their sauces as a base and go from there? Starting with something delicious and taking it to the next level seemed like a much better way to guarantee success and spend a whole lot less money.

NOW, I must give credit where credit is due – my mom has been doing this for years. She gets a jar of Prego, melts in some butter and garlic, and adds ground beef. Bang. Spaghetti sauce in less than 15 minutes. SO, I channeled my inner Mama Simon and took a jar of Classico Traditional (personal preference) pasta sauce to new heights by adding some of my favorite Italian ingredients. 

Key to Success: use real Italian ingredients to nail Moni’s Meat Sauce

This week, I partnered with D’Italia to bring you guys this amazing recipe. As I mentioned in my Instagram story, D’Italia is an online gourmet Italian specialty food and gifts store. They send imported, fresh Italian ingredients right to your door. I had the opportunity to use some of their ingredients in my Valentine’s Day Moni’s Meat Sauce and was seriously impressed.

One of the best things about D’Italia is that they have pre-made gift boxes for every occasion (Risotto gift box, Cannoli Making Gift Box, Pasta a’ casa gift basket). It’s the perfect way to to surprise a loved one with a unique gift – instead of having date night out, bring a little bit of Italy into your own kitchen and cook a pasta sauce with real Italian ingredients! 

If you’re interested in checking them out, use promo code giftlove for 15% any gift box or basket!

For any quality sauce, you need quality pasta!

This is one of the MOST IMPORTANT aspects here, and one that is all too often an afterthought. Normally, I am not too particular about my pasta noodles; I typically just grab any box I see from the grocery store. As I found out this week, however, to really bring this recipe home, quality noodles make all the difference, and D’Italia delivered.

D’Italia sent me Vero Lucano Rigatoni Pasta. this pasta is organic,non-GMO, and SUCH good quality. The pasta adhered to the sauce perfectly and didn’t fall to pieces when I stirred the dish together to serve. It was PERFECT, and now may be the only noodle deserving of my delicious Moni’s Meat Sauce (lol). 

Butter makes Moni’s Meat Sauce 10x more flavorful

This is a given – butter adds flavor to everything. For the health-conscious out there who may be tempted to skip this ingredient, TRUST ME –  it’s worth the calories. When you melt the butter and sauté the shallots and garlic, it adds such a smooth richness to Moni’s Meat Sauce and will make all the difference. It is TO DIE FOR. Don’t skimp on the butter. 

Manipulate the heat to your linking

I use several can’t-miss ingredients to add a bit of kick to Moni’s Meat Sauce.

Normally, I use red pepper flakes in Moni’s Meat Sauce to add a little extra kick. Red Pep flakes are tricky, though, because the heat doesn’t come through until after the sauce has simmered for a while, so it’s difficult to know how much to really use. In my gift package, however, D’Italia actually sent me their Abruzzo Picante Red Pepper Sauce, and I was amazed.  In their Red Pepper Sauce, the red pepper flakes have already been cooked down, adding a consistent amount of heat that shows up right away as you add it into your sauce. 

Bren even noticed a difference (without me telling him) and found the heat to be more consistent throughout the sauce. He liked it way better than usual! It looks like we have found a new staple ingredient..

Another way to add extra heat is with hot Italian sausage. I grew up on ground beef in my mom’s meat sauce, but Brendan has converted me. His family always uses Italian sausage in their pasta sauce and it is just SO much more flavorful. I like to use hot (LOL as you guys clearly know by now) but if you don’t like spicy, use mild or sweet Italian sausage. 

The finishing touch to Moni’s Meat Sauce

Adding Ricotta to Moni’s Meat Sauce (when serving) is actually something we learned from one of our former go-to restaurants in New York City, called Lil Frankie’s. I used to think Ricotta should be reserved for lasagna, but after trying Lil Frankie’s Mezzi Rigatoni with ricotta on top, I was sold.

The ricotta basically brings the whole dish together by making the sauce rich and creamy. Stir it in as you serve to take this sauce to the next level. SO GOOD.A

I love this pasta SO unbelievably much and can NOT WAIT to hear what you guys think! If you’re interested in other fun weekend meal ideas, check out the rest of my blog. If you have any questions, feel free to write me in the comments below!