Italian meatballs with tomato sauce and pasta

Remove the crusts from four slices of sandwich bread and tear into tiny pieces to make a panade.

Top with buttermilk and heavy cream and add the grated cheese, parsley, oregano, basil, optional crushed red pepper and minced garlic; mix to a paste, adding more buttermilk if needed to saturate the bread.

Lightly beat three eggs with a pinch of salt and add to the bowl.

Add the finely diced onion and two tablespoons of tomato paste.

Add a pound each of ground beef, pork and veal and massage until no streaks of meat or panade remain, without over- or under-working.

Form into meatballs, space them out on a parchment-lined baking sheet and roast at 425F until they register 150F, since they finish cooking in the sauce.

Process two 28-ounce cans of whole San Marzano tomatoes to a rough texture.

Heat the olive oil in a large pot over medium high until shimmering and saute the chopped onion two to three minutes until beginning to turn translucent.

Add the sliced garlic and saute 30 seconds, then the tomato paste for another 30 seconds, then the processed tomatoes and a big handful of fresh basil.

Bring to a bare simmer and cook about 30 minutes.

Move the meatballs from the oven into the sauce and simmer together another 30 minutes.

Cook a pound of pasta to about a minute shy of done, drain reserving a cup of the water, then finish cooking the pasta in the pot with that water and about a cup of the sauce.

Kill the heat and mix in a few tablespoons of the leftover garlic bread butter briskly to emulsify with the sauce.

Serve on a platter with plenty of meatballs, toasted garlic bread, Parmesan and fresh basil.