This Homemade Spaghetti Sauce is rich, hearty, and packed with slow-simmered flavor without the long cook time. It’s an easy one-pot sauce to serve over your favorite pasta with homemade garlic bread on the side.
Whether topping spaghetti or using it in lasagna or baked ziti, this sauce adds rich homemade flavor.
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Holly’s Recipe Highlights: Spaghetti Sauce
- Why I Love This Recipe: This sauce is quick to prepare, easy to customize, and so versatile. Plus, it’s made in one pot for easy clean-up!
- Flavor: Rich and savory, with meaty flavor from the beef and sausage, balanced by sweet tomatoes, garlic, and Italian herbs.
- Prep Note: Make a double batch to freeze (your future self will thank you!).
- Tools: Use a Dutch oven (or large pot) to simmer the sauce, and my favorite meat chopper to break up the beef and pork easily.
Cook Time: 40 Mins Servings: 8 Cooking Method: Stovetop
Ingredient Notes
- Ground Beef: Use lean ground beef and drain off any excess grease to keep your sauce from getting oily. Swap for ground turkey, chicken, or pork, though very lean meats may produce a slightly less rich sauce.
- Italian Sausage: Use mild or hot Italian sausage, or make your own homemade Italian sausage. For an all-beef sauce, increase the Italian seasoning and add oregano and red pepper flakes.
- Diced Tomatoes: Choose regular or petite diced tomatoes depending on how much texture you want in the sauce.
- Crushed Tomatoes: For a rich tomato base, add crushed tomatoes or replace it with tomato sauce for a smoother, slightly thinner consistency.
- Tomato Paste: Let the tomato paste cook in the pot for about a minute to help thicken the sauce before adding the other tomatoes.
- Shredded Carrot: Balances the acidity of the tomatoes and adds subtle natural sweetness. Swap for finely diced red bell pepper, or a small pinch of sugar.
How to Make Spaghetti Sauce
- Cook the ground beef, sausage, onion, and garlic. Drain excess fat.
- Stir in the remaining ingredients and let simmer uncovered (full recipe below).
Before serving, taste and adjust the seasonings. Then stir in fresh herbs, saving some to sprinkle on top once plated.
Storing Leftover Spaghetti Sauce
- Refrigerator: Keep leftovers in an airtight container for up to 4 days. Store the sauce separately from cooked spaghetti when possible.
- Freezer: Freeze the sauce in an airtight container for up to 4 months.
- Thawing: Thaw overnight in the refrigerator or defrost gently in the microwave. Then warm over medium-low heat on the stove, stirring occasionally. Add a splash of water if the sauce has thickened.
Love Your Leftovers! Use leftovers to make baked spaghetti, serve them over garlic bread sloppy joe-style, or spoon the sauce over baked spaghetti squash for an easy lunch.
My Favorite Sides for Spaghetti Night
Did you enjoy this Spaghetti Sauce Recipe? Leave a comment and rating below.
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 pound lean ground beef
- ½ pound Italian sausage casings removed, or bulk sausage*
- 1 medium yellow onion diced
- 3 cloves garlic minced
- 1 (28 ounce) can diced tomatoes with juices
- 1 (28 ounce) can crushed tomatoes or tomato sauce
- 6 ounces tomato paste
- 1 cup water
- ¼ cup shredded carrot or a pinch of sugar
- 1½ teaspoons Italian seasoning
- ½ teaspoon dried basil
- ½ teaspoon salt or to taste
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper
- 3 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley or fresh basil (optional)
Instructions
- In a large pot or Dutch oven, cook the beef, sausage, onion, and garlic over medium-high heat until no pink remains, about 5 to 6 minutes. Drain fat.
- Add diced tomatoes, crushed tomatoes, tomato paste, water, carrot, Italian seasoning, basil, salt, and pepper.
- Bring to a simmer over medium-high heat. Reduce the heat to medium-low and let simmer uncovered for 30 minutes or until thickened.
- Taste and season with additional salt and pepper if desired. Stir in fresh parsley if using.
- Serve over spaghetti or cooked pasta.
Notes
- Do not rinse the spaghetti after draining or add butter or oil to the pasta. The starches will help the sauce to cling to the noodles.
- Keep leftovers in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 4 days and in the freezer for up to 4 months.
Nutrition Information
Nutrition information provided is an estimate and will vary based on cooking methods and brands of ingredients used.
Course Main Course, Pasta, Sauce
Cuisine American, Italian© SpendWithPennies.com. Content and photographs are copyright protected. Sharing of this recipe is both encouraged and appreciated. Copying and/or pasting full recipes to any social media is strictly prohibited. Please view my photo use policy here.
Recipe is misleading. Nobody cooks homemade pasta sauce for just 30 minutes. It’s an hour minimum but usually much longer.
It’s not misleading if this is how I make it. :) Of course you can make your recipe your own way and simmer it as long as you’d like!
I cannot tell you how often I come across a recipe that either states, “Add your favorite seasonings” or worse ” Salt and Pepper to your tastes”. To me, this a Hallmark moment of a scammer. You on the other hand spell it out and leave nothing to the imagination. I thank you for just that! Looking forward to making this recipe.
Def 5 STAR
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
I’ve been using this recipe for years. Delicious. Some of the grandchildren don’t like vegetables so I put half a green pepper in sauce for flavor and remove just before serving. In past I’ve also pureed cooked carrots, celery and peppers and added to sauce. Green pepper much easier. Pasta supper tonight with family.
For us, this was too tomato forward and not savory enough. Also a bit sweet and added a splash of wine to neutralize it. Maybe that’s because it doesn’t cook long enough? Tomorrow I’ll add more Italian sausage , and maybe some mushrooms.
I made this & after simmering for half hour it was a little bit too tomato bite. I simmered a couple hours & it turned out perfect. The longer it simmers, the better it gets. I always add peppers & mushrooms to my sauce. I was about to add a bit of sugar to take the bite away, but after I cooked a little longer & tasted there was no need for it. Try simmering a little longer. This is a great recipe.
I think this is the best homemade spaghetti sauce I have every tried! The added carrots instead of sugar was a big plus! It’s an easy recipe as well!
We loved it! I added the shredded carrot and red pepper smaller chunks. This crew is picky, so when they wanted more, that was great! Will definitely add it to the meal rotation. Thanks for the recipe.
Was wondering if you can help me with something..
Hubby and I froze some Roma tomatoes and I figured it’s probably time to make sauce ..
I don’t do well thinking outside the box ..
What do I do to make sauce ?
We also don’t do well with onions , we can handle a little bit of garlic ..
thanks for your time ..
If you have a lot of fresh tomatoes (that have been thawed) this tomato sauce recipe although it does have a little bit of onion for flavor. You can also add cooked Italian sausage and other veggies to the recipe for extra flavor.
If you don’t have lots you can also just peel, seed, and dice the tomatoes and add them in place of the canned diced tomatoes.
Could I use mild Italian turkey sausage with the ground beef?
You definitely could. I think that would be delicious, Pat!
Hi Holly! All of your recipes with pasta sauce makes me drool ! To make this sauce in a crock pot…how long should it be? Thanks so much.
To prepare in a slow cooker, reduce the water to ½ cup. Brown the meat, onion, and garlic as directed and place it in a 6qt slow cooker along with the remaining ingredients. Cook on low for 7 to 9 hours or on high for 3 to 4 hours.
I’ve been making this sauce for a few years now. Husband loves it. Begs for it often. Also it freezes well. This is my forever go to recipe.
Absolutely need to add chopped green pepper and celery to this sauce. Other than that, it is as on the mark as a meat sauce for pasta could possibly be. One final hint, if you find the sauce to be on the acidic side when tasting, a pinch of baking soda in the sauce will solve that without the need of any added sugar.
Thank you for sharing your tips, Barcham!
Question – my family has big meat eaters. Would you suggest doubling the meat and keeping everything else the same if we want more meat, or should we double the whole recipe? Thank you!
This sauce is pretty meaty but you could certainly add a little bit more (up to 2 pounds total). If you’re doubling the meat, you’ll probably need to increase the sauce ingredients a little bit.
yummm
I have a question can I use ground beef and Italian sausage at the same time for this recipe
We do! We use 1 lb of ground beef cooked with ½ lb of Italian sausage.
made this and loved it , added green peppers, red peppers and mushrooms a, and some additional seasonings, mrs dash, oregono, and sea salt .
l loved this recipe. The spaghetti turned out delicious. I will definitely use this recipe again.
I made this in a crock pot……….cooking the meat, onion and garlic in a pan on the stove, before adding to the rest of the ingredients in the crock pot. I added mushrooms and served it over spaghetti noodles and it was wonderful !!!!
I plan to make this recipe for Sunday night dinner. I’m having 9 kids over for dinner. Can I puree the tomato sauce before adding the meatballs? I’m not sure kids will enjoy having whole tomatoes in the sauce.
That should be just fine Judith! If you try it I would love to hear how it turns out!
i am not a cook AT ALL. can i make the sauce without meat to freeze? i want to use fresh meat every time. or does it matter??
You can if you’d like but the meat adds flavor and it freeze really well too.
I love the chili recipe and the taco recipe, but we didn’t care for this one. I made it with the carrots. It was too tangy/sour for us. I tried doctoring it up, but couldn’t get it to taste the way we wanted. I’m going to throw it in the freezer and maybe use it later as a casserole or make something like lasagna where the cheese can help. We tried putting grated Parmesan on it and it helped some.
If can sometimes be the brand of crushed tomatoes that can case it to be tart. You can add either the smallest pinch of baking soda when you reheat it or up to 1 teaspoon of sugar (start with ½ teaspoon). It won’t take much to balance it out, I hope that helps.