Celebrity chef Geoffrey Zakarian started his culinary career at Le Cirque restaurant, but is most well-known for being a judge on Food Network's “Chopped.” Today, most of Zakarian's restaurants revolve around American food, and he knows how to elevate even the most basic meals like Italian-American meatballs.

As demonstrated in a TikTok video, after cooking up his own tomato sauce, Zakarian pan-fries six meatballs in a sizzling pan of fresh rosemary and olive oil, before adding the whole thing to the sauce and allowing it to simmer, covered, for 15 minutes. The real key is the infused (AKA flavored) olive oil in his recipe.

In the video, Zakarian explains that the rosemary and extra virgin olive oil infuse the cooking oil and then infuse the meatballs, which gives the meat some of the flavor notes of the rosemary, like lemon, pine, and pepper. Herb- or spice-infused olive oil can also work wonderfully in salads, soups, and on top of bread.