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I’m so excited to share with you this delicious Crock Pot Spaghetti Sauce Recipe. This spaghetti sauce is the perfect blend of tomatoes and ground beef that makes the perfect spaghetti sauce.
Easy Slow Cooker Spaghetti Sauce:
This spaghetti sauce with ground beef is absolutely amazing. Plus, the slow cooker makes it just so very simple and does all the work for you. You are going to love how hearty and flavorful this spaghetti sauce is after cooking all day in the crock pot.
Cooking the spaghetti sauce in the crockpot makes for an easy weeknight meal. Sure you can use the jar sauce, but this homemade spaghetti sauce is so much better.
Making this spaghetti sauce recipe for crock pot is easy and delicious. The perfect weeknight meal or to feed a crowd for all your easy pasta recipes. Check out more Homemade Sauce Recipes and Easy Ground Beef Recipes with Few Ingredients. You may want to serve this sauce over spaghetti squash.
The Best Spaghetti Sauce:
This budget friendly spaghetti sauce has become a regular dinner on the menu each week. My favorite part is that it cooks in the slow cooker all day.
Combining all the flavors of the ground beef, italian sauce and tomatoes really makes this spaghetti sauce the best I have ever made.
I love that this spaghetti sauce is healthier, cheaper and taste better than the jar stuff.
Spaghetti Sauce Tips:
- Cooking Ground Beef – Place the ground beef in a large skillet and cook with the garlic and onion. While cooking break up in small pieces and drain the grease.
- Combining Ingredients – Combine the ingredients in the slow cooker and allow it to slow cook on low.
- Olive Oil – We like tossing our noodles with olive oil to prevent them from sticking.
Substitutions and Additions:
- Change the Meat – This Crock Pot Spaghetti Sauce recipe includes ground beef and ground sausage. If you want to lighten things up a bit, you can easily substitute one for ground turkey. You could even use half and half.
- Red Wine – If you would like to add in some red wine. I usually add it in right when I begin cooking the sauce.
- Spicy Flavor – You can add in some red pepper flakes to the sauce if you would like it a bit spicier.
- Use Fresh Tomatoes – If you prefer and have them available, fresh tomatoes would be great in this recipe.
- Beef Broth – Add in beef broth of added flavor.
Can I Add Frozen Meatballs instead of Ground Beef?
Yes, I think that is a great idea. Instead of using ground beef substitute with a 2lb bag of frozen meatballs.
We love the texture and flavor it adds to the sauce.
Ingredients for Crockpot Spaghetti Sauce:
- Ground Beef
- Italian Ground Sausage
- Onion
- Minced Garlic
- Crushed Tomatoes – Diced Tomatoes will work also.
- Tomato Sauce
- Tomato Paste
- Italian Seasoning
- Bay Leaves
- Sugar
- Salt and Pepper
How to Make Spaghetti Sauce in Slow Cooker:
- Step 1 – Crumble and brown ground beef and sausage, along with onion and garlic on medium heat in a large skillet.
- Step 2 – Drain excess fat.
- Step 3 – Place meat mixture into slow cooker.
- Step 4 – Add remaining ingredients.
- Step 5 – Cover and cook the sauce on low for 8 hours or on high for 4 hours.
- Step 6 – Serve meat sauce over your favorite pasta before serving, or allow to cool completely and then freeze until ready to use.
How long to Cook Spaghetti Sauce in the Crock Pot?
After cooking the ground beef and italian sausage in a skillet, I combine in the crockpot with the other ingredients. I normally will put everything in the crock pot in the morning and let it cook all day while I am gone.
I set it on low and cook for about 8 hours or on high for about 4 hours.
Can you Overcook Spaghetti Sauce in Slow Cooker?
It is possible to overcook the sauce in the slow cooker. We recommend not cooking the sauce longer than 10 hours.
How to Make Spaghetti Sauce taste like Restaurant?
To make your homemade spaghetti sauce taste like your favorite Italian Restaurant we recommend using fresh ingredients. Add in dried herbs and spices elevates the flavor and can complete transfer your sauce.
We like to add in extra spice with a teaspoon or two of red pepper flakes.
Can you Freeze Spaghetti Sauce with Meat?
This spaghetti sauce freezes great. We like to make a double or triple batch and freeze the leftovers. This allows us to have dinner on the table in under 20 minutes just like you could with the jarred sauce.
Be sure to allow the sauce to cool completely before you freeze it. It will stay fresh in the freezer for 3-4 months. You can heat it up in the crock pot or over the stove top.
Just put it in a ziplock freezer bag or an freezer safe airtight container.
How to Freeze Spaghetti Sauce:
Once you ready to freeze your spaghetti sauce, here are some helpful tips:
- We like using these hands free bag holders during my freezer sessions. They are seriously a life saver. They keep your bags open so you can just dump your ingredients inside. You can snag them very inexpensively on Amazon.
- If you freeze this pasta sauce, it works best to freeze them with each bag being flat. This makes it really convenient to stack them in the freezer.
I love that you can make a huge batch of this spaghetti sauce to freeze or later! Freezing spaghetti sauce is very easy to do. Check out Can you Freeze Spaghetti Sauce for more tips.
Do you have to Brown Ground Beef for Slow Cooker Spaghetti Sauce?
No! You do not have to brown the ground beef first. You can put it in the crock pot and let it do all the cooking.
Just make sure to break it up during the cooking process. You will also want to use a very low fat meat so that there is not excess grease in your spaghetti sauce.
Can I add Uncooked Noodles to the Slow Cooker?
Sure! You can throw in spaghetti or any kind of pasta. Just add in spaghetti during the last hour of cooking.
Break it apart and stir it in. Make sure that the noodles are completely covered in the sauce and add more broth if needed to cover the noodles. This becomes the best one pot meal.
What to Serve with Spaghetti?
Spaghetti is filling on its own, but I always like to make sure I serve with a vegetable.
- A simple salad always is a big hit at my house.
- This Easy Grilled Broccoli side dish is perfect for a side with this spaghetti sauce.
- Also, we love Garlic Bread Cheese Sticks Recipe. These are perfect to dip in the yummy spaghetti sauce! You can get every last drop of that delicious sauce!
How to Thicken Spaghetti Sauce:
If you find your spaghetti sauce is runny, you can easily thicken you spaghetti sauce with a cornstarch rue. Check out How to Thicken Spaghetti Sauce for all the tips to learn.
Print Crockpot Spaghetti Sauce Recipe:
Best Crockpot Spaghetti Sauce Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 lb Ground Beef
- 1 lb Italian Ground Sausage
- ½ Onion
- 1 tbsp minced Garlic
- 4 cans Crushed Tomatoes (15 oz each)
- 2 cans Tomato Sauce (15 oz each)
- 1 can Tomato Paste (6 oz)
- 2 Bay Leaves
- 1 Tbsp Italian Seasoning
- 1 Tbsp sugar
- ½ tsp Salt
- ½ tsp pepper
- ½ cup beef broth
See how we calculate recipe costs.
Instructions
- Brown the ground beef and sausage, along with onion and garlic.
- Drain off any excess fat.
- Place meat mixture into slow cooker.
- Add remaining ingredients.
- Cover and cook on low for 6-8 hours or high for 3-4 hours.
- Serve over your favorite pasta and enjoy!
I made this and it is fantastic. Everyone should try it, if you like meat sauce over any kind of pasta or vegetables or rice!
Absolutely delicious and soooooo easy to make. My daughter hates chopped onions so I went with powdered onion. Will be my go-,to recipe for homemade sauce now! So glad I gave it a try!
You made our day! So happy to hear this is your go to recipe now! Thanks for taking the time comment.
I replaced beef broth with Swanson Spicy Chicken Broth for a litte bite and deeper flavor.
Walter – Love your variations. Thanks for sharing.
This looks really good. Can tomato paste, sauce or juice be used instead of tomatoes.? Don’t do tomatoes!
Thank you
Cindy
Hey Cindy – Yes, you can swap the tomatoes for more tomato paste or sauce. The texture will not be as thick, but the flavor will still be good. Let me know if you try it.
Your sauce recipe is solid, I’m Italian ,and irs close to my family sugo…but, the advice to put oil on your pasta is not really sound, as the sauce will not adhere as well to oiled pasta as it should…up to people to decide I agree, but….the sauce really should stick to the sauce for the most flavor….
Thanks for sharing Katt! I appreciate your tips!
I wish that a serving was better measured by the cup for nutritional purposes. Love the sauce though. Best and easy to make.
Thanks for sharing John! Yes, the serving amount is hard to put an exact size on since each batch is slightly different.
This is by far our favorite crock pot spaghetti sauce recipe. It’s my second time making it and I’ll be pimping it a bit by adding some more veggies and some other spices but wow so good!! First thing I said when I tasted it was “Omg it tastes like my mom’s homemade recipe” Definite win for me! Thank you!!
Emily – I love hearing this so much! You made my day! Thank you so much for sharing and for the positive review! I’m so glad you enjoyed this recipe!
This is by far our favorite crock pot spaghetti sauce recipe. It’s my second time making it and I’ll be pimping it a bit by adding some more veggies and some other spices but wow so good!!! Thank you!!
I am not understanding one recipe video shows using rice wine vinegar and so forth and the other one doesn’t show rice wine vinegar at all or Worcestershire sauce which one is it could I have the one that is the actual crock pot spaghetti sauce
Barbara – I’m so sorry for the confusion. I’m not sure which video is showing rice wine vinegar and Worcestershire sauce being adding. We don’t use these ingredients in this crock pot recipe. The ingredients used are listed at the recipe inside the post. Thank you and I hope you try out the recipe and let me know what you think!
Everything is have cooked from your recipes has come out delicious ?
Thank you so much Gary and thank you for the positive review!
Can I use 2 packs of ground beef instead of sausage
Yes, you can Ashley.
Another win for my picky family! So easy and so delicious. My hubby sometimes has to cook on nights I work and he has recipes that work for him but my son begged me to give this “secret recipe” to dad. Can’t believe it is only 8 servings. We have enough to freeze for another meal or make a lasagna with even though we pile the sauce on and use it to dip in the garlic bread.
I love how easy this is to throw together (and then just let your slow cooker do its magic!). I save myself a bit of effort by using dried minced onion (and reconstituting it with hot water). Instead of ground beef and bulk sausage, I use a pound of frozen meatballs and a pound of link sausage (after sautéing, I cut the links into bite-size chunks). During the final 1/2 hour of simmering,I leave the lid off, allowing the sauce to reduce a bit more; I also add about 1/4 cup of grated Parmesan cheese. A really delicious sauce that’s easy to make. A winner.
Thanks for sharing your tips Bill! They sound like wonderful variations on the original recipe and thank you for the positive review!
Hi, this is my first time cooking this sauce. It smells delicious. I have one question – when I put the sauce together, it seems very thick. I am used to a thinner sauce. Does it get thinner while it cooks? If not, can I add water to it or maybe more broth?
It does thin out as it cooks. Check the consistency about an hour for serving and you can thin down with more water and broth if needed. I hope you enjoy it!
I made this today and it was amazing! My husband said that it tasted like a restaurant and my 2 picky boys even loved it!
This sounds delicious! I was wondering if this sauce will be smooth, my kids don’t like chunks of tomato in their sauce! Thanks
The crush tomatoes does cook down into the sauce so it is pretty smooth but you can use all tomato sauce instead of the crushed tomatoes if you prefer.
Can I not use whole tomatoes in the sauce? I really don’t like tomatoes.
Use you can use more cans of tomato sauce instead of the crushed tomatoes if you prefer.
Excellent flavor and so easy! I doubled it for Christmas Eve and everyone loved it. I thought it would be thin since it was in crockpots, but it was the perfect consistency. This is definitely a keeper! My nieces asked me to share the recipe and I was so happy to do so.
This recipe was so easy to put together and tasted amazing. I added fresh Italian meatballs as well. Will definitely be making this recipe again and again. Thanks for sharing!
I like straight forward and to the point, this recipe was easy and delicious! Served at family dinner and it was a big hit.
2nd’s and take home!! = success
I made this recipe for dinner last night and my wife and I loved it. I used mild sausage and added a teaspoon of hot pepper flakes. I prefer slow cooker recipes because I don’t have to monitor the stove.
Me too! I love this recipe too.
I would like to make this without meat. Do I need to sauté the onions and garlic first?
You do not have to. It should work fine without sauteing first.
I made this today. An Excellent recipe. So easy to make, but the results are so Delicious. Thanks.
I know you said this is for a crowd. How many people are you considering a crowd? My hubby’s birthday is Saturday and I want to make this but trying to see if I need to double it. Thanks
This recipe is for about 8 large servings.
Very good spaghetti sauce 🙂
I’m so glad you liked it. We love this recipe.
In my crockpot as I write this! Taste taste confirmed……YEAH BABY??Thanks for sharing ?
Followed this just as written, it was fabulous !!! The best sauce
Before serving the already-made spaghetti sauce, here is a friendlier reminder to do not forget to remove the bay leaves first.
This is the best spaghetti sauce I have ever had! I made it for our whole family, 10 of us, many of whom are picky eaters. Everyone cleared their plates and went for seconds! Definitely making this again! I would give it 10 stars if I could!! Wow delicious!!!
Can I make your sauce with cheese in it and then freeze it? My husband really loves spaghetti and I would love to make this recipe and freeze it so as to save money. Ty
Yes, you can easily freeze it.
I’m cooking spaghetti sauce in a slow cooker. How often do I open the lid and stir it up?
You do not need to do it much because opening the lid slows down the cooking time. I would say 1-2 times.
This was the best Spaghetti Sauce I have ever made and it was so easy to make, especially in the Crock Pot. My Family loved it and I will make it again. Thank you
thank you so much! I’m so glad you loved it.
My husband and I made a batch of this, OMG…… it turned out awesome! Of course he chose to put a few extra spices in it, as men do…. we had supper,, leftovers the next day, and froze 2-3 more containers! Will definitely make again! I will be trying more of your recipes as well! Thank you!!
Thank you for commenting. I’m so glad you liked it. This is one of my favorite recipes.
Except for the bay leaves and sugar, your recipe is identical to mine, except I have never thought about using the slow cooker. Guess what? I will be doing that from now on! Yayyy! Thanks! I freeze my sauce in two-cup containers, thaw in a three-quart MW safe pot/bowl, add 2 cups of water, and stir in 8 ounces of macaroni or fusilli or any kind of pasta. Stir. Microwave until the pasta is al dente, stopping to stir once. Stir in grated cheddar and/or parmesan cheese, let it melt and serve. Yummy!
Thank you !
You’re welcome!
I’m gonna try this sauce tomorrow. Can I put fresh mushrooms in the crockpot? Should I cook the mushrooms first?
Yum! I think that would be delicious. You don’t have to cook them, I think it would work great to throw them in your crock pot. Let us know how it turns out!
I grow basil in my herb garden and I have a ton – could I use that instead of dried? Thank you! Can’t wait to make this!
Yes, fresh basil would be delicious in this recipe. Thank you!
This looks tasty. I’ll be leaving the peppers out as I prefer them only in my Spanish Rice or American Goulash sauces. My question is how do you prevent the puddle of water on your plate like seen in your photos? This happens with the sauce I make now, just wondTeering if you or someone else has the trick. (I prefer my sauce over top of my noodles vs mixing the noodles into the sauce like true Italians). I’m wanting to try this as I tried sauce in crockpot years and years ago & it tasted “burnt-ish”, thinking I cooked it too long…plus back in the 1990’s the crockpots weren’t as advanced as they are nowadays.
I made this and cooked it over the stove for 2 hours, and it was delicious! I bet the slow cooker way would be amazing.
Thank you for sharing and I’m glad you enjoyed it.
I bought a crockpot specifically for this recipe and it turned out sooooo good! I like my meals a little spicy so I used regular bell peppers and hot Italian sausage. Will be making again!!
This is my 3rd time making this recipe. We love it. It’s my go to recipe now. I’m picky when it comes to sauces and this has the taste I want. It’s very good and simple to make, but lots of flavor. I think the combo of sausage and ground beef make a big difference. Thank you for sharing.
Im making it right now and followed to the exact recipe, it looks like it can feed way more than 6 looks like 12!! Easy recipe I’ll let you know how it came out after dinner!
Love this for making a big batch!
So comforting and perfect for busy nights!
What a great idea, I have never made spaghetti sauce in a slow cooker, I can’t wait to give this a try.
It looks fantastic! Definitely a must-make!
So hearty and delicious, and makes for wonderful leftovers too!
What a great way to make for an easy dinner!
SO easy and flavorful! A winner!
Hands down my favorite way to make spaghetti sauce. The slow cooker does the cooking and the house smells glorious.
Can this be canned? I like to can and I was wondering if this would can well? never canned meat sauce before but I seen your recipe and wanted to try it and thought maybe it would be amazing for my family
I haven’t gotten good at canning yet,but maybe someone else can help us with that.
How does it taste without peppers? My mother-in-law is allergic to any type of sweet pepper? And how many servings does this make?
I think it would still taste great. I would say this serves 4-6 people.