Slow Cooker Spaghetti Sauce
A rich and meaty spaghetti sauce easily made in the crockpot – it makes enough to feed an army and you can freeze the leftovers!
Spaghetti sauce always came in a jar for us. The homemade version never existed. My mom was a home cook but only when it came to Korean food, although she did make a mean baked ziti. It involved store-bought spaghetti sauce of course.
But once I started cooking, my eyes were open to the wonders of homemade spaghetti sauce. I’ve made several variations throughout the years but my new favorite spaghetti sauce has to be this crockpot version. Loaded with crumbled ground beef and spicy Italian sausage, this gets cooked in a stew of amazing flavors for 8 hours. Yes, 8 hours!
Simply crumble up your beef, throw it in your slow cooker, and come back from work to the most comforting smell of all with a giant pot of spaghetti goodness. Best of all, it makes enough to feed an army so you can either take the leftovers to work the next day or throw it in the freezer!
Slow Cooker Spaghetti Sauce
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 pound ground beef
- 1 pound Italian sausage, casings removed
- 1 onion, minced
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 3 14.5-ounce cans diced tomatoes, drained
- 2 15-ounce cans tomato sauce
- 3 bay leaves
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium high heat. Add ground beef, sausage, onion and garlic. Cook until browned, about 4-5 minutes, making sure to crumble the beef and sausage as it cooks; drain excess fat.
- Place ground beef mixture into a slow cooker. Stir in diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, bay leaves, oregano, basil, salt and pepper, to taste. Cover and cook on low heat for 8 hours.
- Stir well and serve immediately.
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How much would I need to serve 8 people?
This recipe yields about 6 servings. You can double/triple the recipe as needed.
Cook on high or low? Crucial information missy
Please refer to the recipe:
Cover and cook on low heat for 8 hours.
This is one great recipe, i cant even tell you the amount of times ive made this. simple and yet so much flavor. i love how much it makes as there is always extra to freeze. love love love this!!
First recipe I tried on your site and it is great. Looking forward to trying some of the other slow cooker recipes.
I just used this recipe as a guide for a quick lunch and it turned out pretty good!! I only had one can of tomato sauce and one tomato on hand. I also used frozen meatballs instead of sausage and cooked it all on the stove top. Despite all the modifications I had to make, it was good!
Can’t wait to try the full recipe next time with the Crock-Pot!
Should I do anything different if I am not planning on putting any meat in it? Or can I just do all the other steps? Would you still cook it for the same amount of time? Thank you! Your recipes are always my favorite!
Yes, cooking time may have to be reduced as needed.
My sweetie declared this the best spaghetti sauce I’ve ever made for him — nice and thick — just like he likes it. I made two changes to the basic recipe. I added two small cans of tomato paste and I cooked the batch in the crock pot overnight for 10 hours. The next morning I put the crock in the fridge. I reheated the batch in a large pot on the stove at dinner time and added my cooked pasta when it was ready.
Had to make my own italian sausage using sausagemeat and herbs but came out great. My only alterations were 2 x cans of diced tomato rather than 3 and 1 x 400g (14oz) carton of pasata instead of the 2 cans of tomato sauce as some said it could be a little thin. It looked thick at first but with the moisture from cooking it’s now a perfect thickness for me. Also put in 1tbsp of brown sugar. YUM. That’s 3 out of 3 hits from your slow cooker recipes getting me through a busy week. I could live off just this website! If you ever want to adopt a Brit, I’m there.
I’m the only onw who did not find the sauce watery enough 🙁 I think I will keep the juice of the diced tomatoes next time!
This is delicious but comes out a little soupy, is there a way to thicken it up?
Here is a great forum worth checking out. Hope that helps!
I am always looking for new sauce recipes. I have to say this was a major disappointment. The sauce is way to tangy or acidity. If I had to give it a 1 – 10, I’m going with a solid 2.
Tangy? Hmmmmm, there’s nothing here that would result in that kind of taste – did you follow the recipe exactly as written without any substitutions?
This looks fantastic and it’s getting great reviews, which makes me hopeful. But I really don’t care for diced tomatoes (the texture… I just can’t). Could I sub more tomato sauce, or would something else work better? Thanks!
Yes, you can substitute tomato sauce.
This recipe looks delicious but I have 40 pounds of tomatoes from our garden this year is there a way to substitute fresh tomatoes for canned diced???
Here is a great recipe for Homemade “Canned” Diced Tomatoes!
Thank you for this recipe! My boyfriend and I made this as part of our weekly meal prep and it was the best homemade sauce recipe I have ever used! We followed the recipe exactly as posted besides substituting fire roasted diced tomatoes instead of regular diced tomatoes (bought these cans at Trader Joe’s) and everything turned out delicious without further adjustments. Using a slow cooker made prep so easy that this recipe will now be a staple of ours. Thanks again!
I am making this wonderful sauce for the second time now. I keep pretty much to recipe except I only put in 2 tins of tomatoes instead of 3 and I cook in my crock pot on low for 10 hours. It’s only been in the crock pot an hour and already the house smells damn delicious!
This was the best sauce ever. I did add a couple tablespoons of brown sugar to cut down on the acidity of the tomatoes. I even caught my family eating it heated up in bowls without the spaghetti noodles, just enjoying with toast. They also thought I could add beans to it for chili. This one is a keeper. Thank you.
I also added a small can of tomato paste.
I made this. I added a tablespoon Italian Seasoning and 1/4 cup brown sugar (to cut the acidity of the tomatoes). This was awesome!
Hi! I stumbled upon this recipe and it looks yummy! Just wanted to know if this could all be mixed together the night before and then crock pot turned on in the morning? Thanks 🙂
Yes, absolutely!
Looks great. QUESTION. …Do you stir everything together before you cook it and just pile it in as in the picture and stir at the end?
It is best to stir everything together.