meatball sandwich casserole

Alright so, the next new dinner was suppose to be French Toast Bake however, I switched some things around and we will have that on Friday. Tonight's dish, Meatball Sandwich Casserole. Not quite as successful as last night's dinner, but still good. Sadly, this isn't a Skylar friendly food so she had to settle with a hotdog. But I covered it in sauce and mozzarella cheese for her :).

Meatball Sandwich Casserole

I got this recipe from Pearls, Handcuffs, and Happy Hour. There were a couple other recipes on that blog that I also hope to try.

I, like usual, changed something big with the original recipe. You will see it in red. And before people give me a hard time, I WOULD have given in to the onion/pepper mix but I didn't have it and I wanted to make it tonight. Next time I will use it, just to try it the "right" way.

The ingredients...

1 Baguette French Bread, cut into 18-24 slices, 1/4 inch thick {I could not find a Baguette, so I just used a loaf of French Bread. It turned out to be 16 or so slices about 1/4 inch thick}
Olive Oil
1 pkg. frozen Italian meatballs, bite sized, about 1 lb {I used 2 lbs because I used two baking dishes, and 1 lb just didn't seem like enough}
1 pkg. frozen onion & bell pepper mix, thawed & drained {Go ahead and yell. I didn't do this part. But I PROMISE to use it next time!}
1 1/2 cups spaghetti sauce {used Prego Tomato & Basil and I used 2 cups}
1 cup mozzarella cheese, shredded

What I used...

Preheat oven to 350. Meanwhile, slice your bread.

Brush each slice with olive oil on one side. I didn't have a brush so I just used a spoon to "brush" it on. Line the bottom and the side with the bread slices...oil side up...slightly overlapping the slices on the side. You will need a deep casserole dish. The lady I got this from used her 1 qt. Corningware. But because I was using a bigger loaf of bread, I didn't have a lot of room so I used two of my Coringware, a 1 1/2 qt. and a 2 1/2 qt. That's a big reason why I used more meatballs and more sauce too.

Bake bread for about 5-10 minutes or until the edges are golden brown.

In a separate bowl, mix meatballs, (bell pepper & onion mix), & spaghetti sauce to coat.

Remove the bread from the oven and spoon the meatball mixture into the dish on top of the bread. Return to oven and bake for 25-30 minutes or until thoroughly heated through in the center. 

Here's where things didn't go so great for me....25-30 minutes didn't even warm the center. So after probably and hour, the middle was hot (ish) and then I put the cheese on for another 5 -10 min. The recipe never made it clear whether I should have thawed the meatballs first or not. So, next time, I will.

The result....a way too crunchy top and a way too soggy bottom. The middle was good though, and the family still liked it. I was of course bummed, but if I don't try I will never learn, right? Marc probably wonders who this women in the kitchen is and where in the world did Sutton go...but I don't think he is complaining :).

Until next time....