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Healthy Spaghetti and Meatballs: 2 Secret Ingredients

The key to the greatest meatballs, unfortunately, is using tender, fatty ground meat....which is why many of the best recipes include both ground beef and ground pork (and sometimes ground veal). A...

By steamykitchen · From Open Recipes · 14 ingredients
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Healthy Spaghetti and Meatballs: 2 Secret Ingredients

Why it works: Onion and garlic match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,058 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓

Healthy Spaghetti and Meatballs: 2 Secret Ingredients

6 servings
Prep10 min
Cook25 min

Ingredients

Directions

Step-by-step directions aren't available for this recipe. See the full recipe at the source →

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

1062Calories
68 gProtein
30 gFat
132 gCarbs

Counts 12 of 13 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 12 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Chicken100g cooked165
Parmesan Cheese1 oz (28g)110
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Corn1/2 cup kernels (82g)77
Tofu100g firm76
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Tomato1 medium (123g)22
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Garlic1 clove (3g)4
Basil5 leaves fresh (2.5g)1
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Meatballnot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By steamykitchen. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  2. Tomato + basiltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Tomato + garlictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,076 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  4. Garlic + basiltop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,805 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  5. Tomato + corntop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Swap the basil

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, onion, butter, turkey, tofu, garlic, corn):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Cuminfits about as well
  3. Oreganofits about as well
  4. Basilthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, onion, butter, turkey, tofu, garlic, corn. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.