A fun and easy family dinner idea made with just a few ingredients! Kids especially love the whimsical cupcake shape and savory flavor. This is such a creative and delicious muffin tin recipe, perfect for a quick family meal or filling snack.
Course: Appetizer, Main Course, Snack
Cuisine: Italian
Keyword: easy dinner, few ingredients, fun snacks, mini muffin tin, quick meal
Servings: 24cupcakes
Equipment
1 mini muffin tin
Ingredients
24small frozen meatballs (1oz size)
1(8oz)tube Pillsbury crescent dough sheet
1cuppizza sauce
1cupshredded mozzarella cheese
Instructions
Cook the meatballs according to the package instructions, only cut the cook time in half since they will be cooking again once they are stuffed into the Pillsbury crust.
Preheat oven to 375° F (this happens to be the same temperature that my Costco brand meatballs were cooking at).
While the meatballs are cooking, open the tube of sheet dough and place it onto a large cutting board. Use a pizza cutter to cut it into 24 equal squares.
Grease a 24-count mini muffin tin with cooking spray and place your cut dough squares into each cup.
Use a small spoon to evenly distribute about a teaspoon of pizza sauce onto the bottom of the dough.
Place your cooked meatballs on top of the sauce and push them down so that the sauce kind of spreads and wraps around them.
Top with approximately one more teaspoon of pizza sauce.
Evenly top each sauce-covered meatball with shredded mozzarella cheese. You could also add a little parmesan if you’d like!
Bake for 10-14 minutes or until the dough is thoroughly cooked.
Allow them to cool for a few minutes before removing from the pan. We usually dip them in the remaining pizza sauce we have left in the jar because we like things extra saucy.
Notes
I used the Kirkland Signature Costco brand of Italian beef meatballs for this recipe.
If you can't find the Pillsbury crescent dough sheet at the grocery store, you could also use refrigerated pizza dough or crescent rolls.
We love Rao's pizza sauce, but it's expensive! Any kind of pizza sauce or even marinara works well for this recipe.
For extra flavor, feel free to season with Italian seasoning or garlic powder before adding the cheese.
If you end up with any leftovers, try reheating them in the air fryer. Yummy!