Sunday Red Gravy

I decided to break out the behemoth braising pot and make a very large batch of red gravy, or as some would call it Italian spaghetti sauce Nola Sicilian style.

I make it with a good amount of tomato paste along with other tomato products because that’s how I learned to make it and that’s how I like it.

I made homemade meatballs, fork tender pork rib meat, and Italian sausage. Originally I had planned to make all of this with spaghetti but I remembered I had some leftover stuffed shells in the freezer so I just baked the shells and had the meat on the side to accompany the shells. The shells are stuffed with a combo of shredded pork, shredded beef roast, chopped spinach and Romano cheese. The shell meat was previously slow cooked in red gravy until it could be shredded by a couple of forks.

My gravy and meat ingredients:



Meatballs prepared. I usually stick them in the oven briefly rather than fry them as it saves time and it doesn’t make any difference in taste to me given how long they cook in the gravy:



Italian sausage and boneless pork ribs lightly browning in olive oil:





Onions sautéing. Garlic, crushed red pepper and a little oregano came shortly after this pic:



Tomato paste mixed with the onions and garlic and lightly frying:



Meatballs out of the oven:



So it begins. I let it simmer for about 4 hours today:



Happiness/weight gain: