Michael Landon's Favorite Spaghetti Sauce is the Ultimate Cozy Fall Dinner
- Michael Landon, known for his role in Little House on the Prairie, had a signature spaghetti sauce recipe that included unique ingredients like cloves and green peppers.
Michael Landon became a household name thanks to his role as hard-working father Charles Ingalls in the Little House on the Prairie series. He also went on to star in plenty of other big-name shows, including Highway to Heaven and reportedly appeared on the cover of TV Guide 22 times, second only to Lucille Ball.
Over the years, Michael Landon 's castmates have shared amusing stories about working with the actor, including one from his Little House on the Prairie co-star Melissa Gilbert , who told Edify Show that Landon loved to play pranks on her children and his own. Gilbert shared that Landon would playfully "throw food" like peas and potatoes at the kids.
It seems that Landon also liked to play around in the kitchen and when it came to cooking, he had a signature dish that stayed on the plate: his hearty homemade spaghetti sauce. Recently resurfaced on social media, Michael Landon's spaghetti sauce recipe has fans (including me) wondering how it tastes. To find out, I put the star's recipe to the test in my kitchen to see if it would be a hit in my little house.
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Ingredients You Need to Make Michael Landon's Favorite Spaghetti Sauce
Courtesy Korin Miller
There are a lot of ingredients that go into this sauce, but you likely have most of in your kitchen already. You'll need olive oil, butter, garlic, onion, ground beef, ground pork, a green bell pepper, bay leaves, cloves, dried thyme, celery, a can of tomatoes, mushrooms, beef broth and tomato paste.
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How to Make Michael Landon's Favorite Spaghetti Sauce
If you've made a meat sauce in the past, Michael Landon's recipe won't be a shocker. It follows a fairly standard process. You start by sautéing garlic and onion before adding in ground beef and ground pork. Let the meat brown before adding in the chopped green pepper, bay leaves, cloves, thyme, celery, canned tomatoes and mushrooms.
Season the meat and vegetable mixture with salt and pepper, then add the beef broth. Lower the heat, cover the pan and let the sauce simmer for two hours. Drain off any excess liquid, and then add the can of tomato paste. Cook the sauce for another 15 minutes before serving it over spaghetti with grated Parmesan cheese on top.
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My Honest Review of Michael Landon's Favorite Spaghetti Sauce
Courtesy Korin Miller
I've made Bolognese sauce plenty of times, but Michael Landon's meaty sauce veers in a very American direction. At first, I was skeptical. I mean, his sauce calls for a few unexpected ingredients, like cloves and green peppers. But after a few hours simmering on the stove, I was pleasantly surprised by the result.
The sauce is packed with meat, which means it needs plenty of seasoning to balance things out. When I followed Landon's directions exactly, the sauce tasted a little flat. With a few small adjustments—extra thyme, garlic, oregano, garlic powder and a generous sprinkle of Pecorino Romano—the flavors really came together. A bit more salt also helped bring everything into balance.
The finished dish was hearty, comforting and surprisingly kid-friendly. Even my notoriously picky children cleaned their plates. While this pasta sauce does take some time, it's well worth the effort—and easy to customize with your favorite spices.
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A Few Tips For Making Michael Landon's Spaghetti Sauce
1. Find those whole spices.
Landon's recipe doesn't mention this, but munching into a clove in particular isn't going to feel (or taste) great. The cloves can be tricky to locate because they can look like the ground meat so you might want to put them in a spice bag before adding them to the pot. At least, be sure to count how many you add so you can make sure you got them all.
2. Season as you go.
The recipe only mentions adding salt and pepper at one point, but most home cooks know to season as they go. Definitely do that with this recipe.
3. Brown your onions and garlic well.
This will create a nice caramelization that will deepen the flavor of the sauce. While you're at it, consider adding the mushrooms during this step to get them nice and garlicky.
4. Don't skimp on the cheese.
A hard cheese with a little bite, like Parmesan or Pecorino Romano, really kicks the flavor up a notch.
5. Consider adding some heat.
Red pepper flakes can infuse a little heat, creating a new dimension for this sauce.
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This story was originally reported by Parade on Sep 25, 2025, where it first appeared in the Food & Drink section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
