Meatballs are a great opportunity to add a little extra unseen veg into a meal. This bake is full of extra veg in both the meatballs and the sauce and the kids can’t get enough of it!

This looks like a very long ingredient list but it’s only because you’re doing the meatballs and the sauce and throwing a few extras in for good measure!

Ingredients-

1 small carrot

1 small courgette

1 small and 1 large onion

500g pork mince

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon cumin

2 teaspoons parsley

1 tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce

2 tablespoons grated Parmesan

Black pepper

1 egg

Olive oil

1 large red pepper

2-3 cloves of garlic

10-12 cherry tomatoes

1 tin of chopped tomatoes

1 tsp oregano

1 tsp basil

1 tsp marjoram

Mushrooms

Black olives

Linguine

Cheddar

Finely chop the small onion. Finely grate the carrot and courgette

Pick up a handful of the grated courgette and carrot and squeeze as much juice out into the sink as you can then use a paper towel to get the last moisture out as in the picture.

Put the onion, squeezed carrot and courgette into a large bowl

Add 1 tsp of cumin, 2 tsp of parsley, plenty of black pepper and a tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce

Add 2 tablespoons of grated Parmesan

Then an egg and a tablespoon of olive oil.

Mix everything together

Grab a small handful of the mixture sand fork into a ball. Put the balls onto a baking tray

Pop the meatballs into a preheated oven at 180 degrees for 20-25mins

Meanwhile- Finely chop the large onion, cut the pepper into small cubes and cut the cherry tomatoes in half. Also- finely chop the garlic (forgot to do that before I took the pic!)

Heat a little olive oil in a pan and add the onions. Cook on a medium heat for 5mins

Add the garlic and pepper and continue cooking for a couple of mins

Add the cherry tomatoes and continue cooking for a couple of mins

Add a tin of tomatoes then fill a third of the tin with water and add to the pan

Add a tsp of basil, a tsp of oregano, a tsp of marjoram, plenty of black pepper and a little salt

Bring to the boil then let it simmer away while the meatballs are cooking

Meanwhile- peel and chop 10-12 mushrooms into quarters and cut a handful of black olives in half. Put them into the bottom of an oven proof dish and drizzle a little olive oil over. Pop into the oven for 10mins

Cook around 200g of linguine for around 2mins less than the packet suggests

When the meatballs are cooked remove from the oven. A little ‘leaking’ like this is normal

Take the mushroom dish out of the oven and add the cooked linguine, mixing it with the mushrooms and olives

Place the meatballs on top of the pasta

Pour over the tomato sauce

Grate plenty of cheddar over the top. You could add some mozzarella too if you like! Pop back into the oven for 20-25mins.

Try not to eat it all at once!!