I recently wrote an article that was published in the Fall 2018 edition of The Old Schoolhouse magazine entitled Meal Planning: How to Save Time and Money. In the article, I discussed ways to prepare large quantities of ground meat, chicken hindquarters, pork loins, chicken breasts, ham, and turkey when bought on sale to simplify future meals while saving some money.

One of the tips I discussed was using ground meat to prepare and freeze homemade meatballs for future use. I really like that frozen meatballs can be tossed in a slow cooker with spaghetti sauce and cooked for a few hours for an easy dinner of meatball bombers – meatballs, sauce, and mozzarella cheese on a long bun.

I always add more meatballs than my family will eat in one meal to the slow cooker when cooking the meatballs since there is always extra spaghetti sauce. I use the leftover meatballs and spaghetti sauce for spaghetti (just prepare some noodles), or I let my daughters make their own homemade personal pizzas. These little pizzas are so simple for kids to make!

My daughters enjoy making and eating these tasty pizzas. Although we often make them when we have leftover meatballs and spaghetti sauce, they could be made any time with ingredients you have on hand. These are the typical ingredients we use when making these personal pizzas.

• slices of bread
• leftover spaghetti sauce (although pizza sauce would work)
• leftover meatballs, cut into small pieces
• shredded cheese
• spices/ seasonings (optional)

I put the spaghetti sauce into a small bowl and the bread on a sprayed cookie sheet. My daughters scoop and spread the sauce onto the pieces of bread using a spoon. Then, my daughters layer the bread with the shredded cheese. Next, they put the leftover meatballs across the tops. Sometimes, they will also add other seasonings such as Italian seasoning.

Once the little pizzas are assembled, I place them in the oven at 350F. Since the meat had already been cooked, I only have to cook the pizzas until the cheese is melted and the bottoms are slightly browned (about 10-15 minutes).

They may not be fancy, but these pizzas get the little ones involved with cooking while using up leftovers. Even little ones can be chefs like the girl in the book Jobs of a Preschooler!

Do your kids like to help in the kitchen?