Here’s another one from the book-themed baby shower, titled “cloudy with a chance of spaghetti and meatballs.” I wanted to make them into individual “cups” so the guests wouldn’t have to worry about the potential mess from picking up pasta from a big bowl, plus it really classes up this ordinary and common dish. These spaghetti cups will be a big hit at your NYE party, or any other celebrations!
To save time, you can use your favorite brand of store-bought meatballs – I like the trusty Aidells. And if you don’t have time to make tomato sauce from scratch, use a good quality jarred sauce that is not too watery. People will be ogling over the cute and dainty cups and no one will care if you use store-bought sauce and meatballs.
Spaghetti and Meatball Cups
Recipe adapted from Spaceships and Laser Beams & Emily Bites
Yields ~12 cups
Ingredients
- ~12 meatballs
- 1 small jar Marinara Sauce
- 8 oz Spaghetti, regular or thin, broken into 3 inch pieces
- 1/4 cup shredded or grated Parmesan Cheese
- 1/4 cup shredded Mozzarella Cheese
- 2 egg whites
- Extra Mozzarella or Parmesan cheese, to garnish (optional)
- Parsley or basil, to garnish (optional)
Directions
- If the meatballs you are using are raw- thaw and brown them according to the instructions on the packaging. They do not need to be fully cooked yet.
- In a large sauce pan, add your browned meatballs to the jar of marinara sauce. Allow to cook COVERED in sauce over medium heat for about 20 minutes, stirring very gently a couple of times.
- While meatballs are cooking in sauce, you can start on your pasta. Bring a large pot of water to a boil, and cook your broken pieces of spaghetti for 8-10 minutes (or as the allotted time states on the package). Drain the spaghetti, run under cold water until cool. The noodle shouldn’t be too hot to handle.
- Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.
- In a medium sized bowl whisk your egg whites together, and then add to cool pasta. Stir in mozzarella and Parmesan cheeses until combined.
- Lightly spray a 12 cup muffin pan (or a mini pan if you want smaller portions to go a long way) with cooking spray, and place 1/3 cup of spaghetti mixture to each cup in the pan. Press down on the center and up the sides of the spaghetti with your fingers, forming a “bowl”.
- Place in oven and bake for 15 minutes at 400 degrees.
- When spaghetti cups are finished baking, allow to cool for a minute or so, and remove them onto your serving plate with a fork. When you are ready to serve them to your guests, add a tablespoon (or a teaspoon if using mini cups) of Marinara sauce (from Meatballs), then add a meatball and garnish with cheese and herb.
These will be great topped with roasted squashes and peppers, making it vegetarian friendly.
Get in my belly!
Cin Cin, Let's Eat! 
love this!
Great idea…. lots of scope for different fillings too 🙂
Great idea!
Love the nests! So cool. Thx for sharing. -cheers
I gasped when I saw this. Coolest party idea EVER! Happy New Year!
Happy new year!
Fabulous idea! I agree that there are so many ways you could use the nests! (Isn’t there a Chinese dish that makes use of noodle nests?)
Wow these look great. I am going to have to try these with gluten-free pasta