Italian
The Frugal Foodie
From
The Frugal Foodie
season
1
episode
7
One Pan Mozzarella Meatball Subs
With
Steph De Sousa
Italian-American meatball subs cooked in one pan, finished with melted mozzarella.
About this recipe
Pork and beef meatballs browned then simmered through tomato in the same pan, blanketed with torn mozzarella and run under the grill to melt. Loaded into split rolls. Italian-American sub-shop cooking, one pan, no shortcuts on the sear.
The Italian-American meatball sub is the New York deli classic that exists nowhere in actual Italy. Born in the early-twentieth-century Italian immigrant communities of the American north-east, the dish takes the southern Italian meatball-in-tomato tradition and stuffs it into a soft Italian-style sub roll with melted mozzarella, creating something that's neither European nor purely American but defines the Italian-American culinary inheritance.
The pork-and-beef mince blend is the structural ratio that matters. Pure beef produces a denser, leaner meatball; pure pork produces a softer, fattier one. The 50/50 blend (or the 60/40 lean-to-rich) hits the sweet spot of texture and flavour, with enough fat to keep the meatball juicy through the cook and enough beef for the savoury depth.
The one-pan method is the home-cook efficiency move. Brown the meatballs in olive oil first (hard, all the way around, so the crust develops); push to one side; add the tomato sauce to the same pan and simmer with the meatballs nestled in for fifteen minutes; cover with torn mozzarella and run under the grill until the cheese melts and bubbles. Load into split rolls with a few basil leaves; the rolls soak up the excess tomato sauce and become part of the dish. A cold Peroni or a glass of cheap red alongside; napkins by the stack.
Ingredients
- 1 x Westacre Mozzarella Cheese ball
- 1 x 500gm Ironbark packet of ground Pork and Beef mince
- 1 small Brown Onion, finely diced
- 1 tsp Stone Mill Finely crushed Garlic
- 1 Lodge Farm Lodge Egg
- 1 teaspoon Stone Mill Sea Salt
- 1/2 teaspoon Stone Mill Cracked Black Pepper
- 1 teaspoon Stone Mill Italian seasoning
- 1/2 cup White Mill Breadcrumbs
- The Olive Tree Australian Extra Virgin Olive Oil
- 1 jar Remano Australia Tomato Passata
- 1 x 6 pack of Bakers Life Hotdog rolls
Method
1. Preheat your oven to 200°C
2. Cut the Mozzarella Cheese into cubes, about 1x1cm
3. In a large bowl, mix the Mince, Breadcrumbs, Egg, Garlic, Onion, Salt, Pepper, and Italian seasoning until just combined.
4. Using your hands, roll the mixture into balls, about 4cm’s in diameter, inserting a piece of Cheese into the centre of each Meatball, enclosing completely with the mince.
5. In a large oven-safe pan, heat a drizzle of Olive Oil over medium heat cook the meat balls to seal, browning them on all sides
6. In the same pan, pour in the Passata sauce to cover and cook on low, simmering for 15-20mins, or until the Meatballs are cooked through
7. Remove from the oven and spoon onto sliced Baguette
8. Keywords
9. one pan mozzarella meatball subs, meatball subs, mozzarella meatball subs, meatball mozzarella sub, meatball sub recipes, one pan meals, one pot meals
Steph De Sousa
Steph De Sousa cooks as The Frugal Foodie, building recipes around what's already in the pantry and the produce nobody wants to throw out. Her style is straightforward and budget-aware without being austere: roast vegetable peelings, second-day rice, a freezer worked properly. She brings practical home rhythms to Savour and Wander.
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