Ingredients

For the meatballs

500g minced beef or pork or 250g of both
The breadcrumbs from two slices of white bread
One fleshy green chilli, de-seeded and de-veined, very finely chopped
1 clove garlic, very finely chopped
Half a small onion, very finely chopped
Salt and black pepper
Two tbs Worcestershire Sauce
1 egg, beaten
Handful of fresh parsley, very finely chopped

For the tomato sauce

Eight fresh tomatoes
1 tbs olive oil
1 tbs tomato puree
1tsp sugar
Salt and black pepper
handful of fresh basil leaves, plus another handful to garnish
I mug of cold water

Method

In a large bowl combine the meat, breadcrumbs, chopped chilli, chopped onion, chopped garlic and beaten egg. Season the whole mixture with the Worcestershire Sauce and the salt and pepper.

Get your hands in it and really give it a good mush together, making sure the ingredients are properly mixed together. You should end up with a lovely sticky gloop of meatball mixture.

Now divide the mixture into golf ball-sized balls and roll them roughly into shape.

Leave them in the fridge while we make the sauce.

Take the fresh tomatoes and score the skin of each one with a sharp knife. Pop them into a bowl of boiling water and leave for about 10-20 minutes.

After 10-20 minutes, making sure the water is not hot enough to burn your hands, you should be able to peel the skin off the tomatoes fairly easily - chop them roughly.

Put the onion and garlic into into a saucepan with the oil. Fry them for about 5 mins until beginning to colour. Now add the rest of the sauce ingredients.

Bring to the boil and then reduce the heat to very low and cook for about 20 minutes. Remove from the heat and allow to cool slightly. Place the sauce in a blender and blend until smooth.

Return the sauce to the rinsed-out pan and bring back to a simmer.

Add your meatballs evenly to the sauce, making sure they are all covered by stirring them very gently to avoid breaking them up.

Simmer for 30-35 minutes on a low heat.

Serve with spaghetti.

For the recipe and a video on how to make your own fresh pasta to go with this dish, click here.