Okay, Liz asked for the recipe, and here it is, more or less:
- Olive oil
- Onions, chopped (about one onion per 3-4 pounds of tomatoes)
- Garlic, minced (about 1 clove per 3-4 pounds tomatoes)
- Fresh tomatoes (tomato wrangling tips below), with their juices, lots
- Fresh basil (about 15 leaves per 3-4 pounds of tomatoes), washed very well and chopped roughly
- Tomato paste (about 1 T per 3-4 pounds of tomatoes)
- Sugar, not a whole lot (this balances acidity)
- Salt and pepper
Heat the olive oil in a heavy-bottomed saucepan and add the onions, sauteeing until translucent. Add the garlic and continue sauteeing. Meanwhile, wrangle the tomatoes.
There are a few ways you can do this: if you want a smooth sauce, you can just chop up the tomatoes, skins and seeds and all, and toss them into the pot. When the tomato mixture is cooked, you can process the sauce through a food mill or colander to get the skins and seeds out. Drawbacks: time-consuming, and you lose the basil, too, because it won’t go through the mesh.
You don’t want to use a blender or food processor for this job, because you will break the seeds and make the sauce bitter.
If you want a skinless, seedless and chunky sauce, you can peel and seed the tomatoes prior to chopping them. This is a royal pain in the ass, too, but gives a nice result.
Or, you could do what I did, and just ignore the seeds and skins. Still tastes good, and lots of fiber.
Onward: once the onions and garlic are translucent, add the remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. Lower the heat to medium low and cook uncovered, stirring occasionally, for 30-45 minutes, or until the sauce has reduced quite a bit. It won’t look like it when it starts, but the tomatoes will break down quite a bit and release a lot of liquid.
This is where you want to get out the food mill or colander, if using. Cook for a little while longer after adjusting the seasonings until it reaches a consistency that appeals to you, and you’ll have a fabulous sauce.
This sounds yummy.
I don’t usually use onions when I make mine, and usually simmer with pork (either chops or good sausage). When I am motivated, I simmer it with a good braciola (but since this takes extra steps, its usually pork). Of course, not very vegan. I’m going to give it a whirl doing it the vegan way and see how that goes over. The kids will probably love it.
I sometimes mince carrots and celery (or other random veggie artifacts that need using up) and simmer it in the sauce–gives the kids that extra dose of veggies without fuss. Sort of “hides” it from them on the pasta they love.
This one’s All About the Tomatoes, so it works best fairly simple.
I dunno… as a Cougar, I think I’m a meat eater
Sounds good. I’d toss in a bay leaf or two, as well.
Bay leaves always remind me of winter stews for some reason.
BTW, Kat? You picked up that pork thing from your Italian in-laws, didn’t you?
God knows Mom only used ground beef, or everyone would kvetch. Well, I kvetched about the ground beef itself, but I never did care for meat sauce until I had it at one of Mario Batali’s restaurants.
Yes, the New York-Italian in-laws were quite concerned that my knowledge of sauce stopped and ended with Ragu. I mean, how horrific. It really did cause actual concern. How would I feed my husband properly out of a jar?
They especially thought it upsetting at my pronunciation of food words… I went with the phonetic pronunciation, as in “cal-i-mar-i” whereas the correct pronunciation, i was told, is “gall-eee-maad” and I’m not kidding when I say I had to practice that. While gutting 20 lbs of gall-eee-maad and scungili for Christmas Eve. But the results were worth it.
In any case, Gina, my sister-in-law, told me that she always flavored hers with pork or braciola, and fresh basil that she grew in her garden and kept frozen all winter. She also told me that only heathens used Hunts tomatoes…. if I MUST used pre-processed tomatoes, Pomi were the best (the cartons helped keep the flavor) and in a pinch I would not be shunned if I used Contadina. Michelle, who was more weight-conscious, used skinless chicken breasts to flavor her sauce and no olive oil. Father-in-law used sausage… he taught me how to parboil the links to remove the skin before putting them in the sauce… or made meatballs and dropped them uncooked in the sauce to simmer for hours.
Not one of them used ground beef. To this day, I used Gina’s recipe the most… she almost showed me how to make a killer Vodka sauce but in cooking for the boys mostly, that doesn’t happen often.
Speaking of meatballs… remember Amalia? The recipe for her amazing meatballs was for every one pound of ground meat (mix of pork, lamb, beef), add EIGHT eggs and bind with good Italian breadcrumbs. Not healthy, but amazingly good.
Oh, yeah. Amalia’s meatballs.
I once had dinner at the home of a friend from college, an Italian girl from Bridgeport. Her grandma made meatballs that had little bits of salami and cheese stuffed in the middle. Boy, were those good.
OK, now you have me drooling — literally, drooling! — at the keyboard. I wish I could get my husband to accept that level of basil. *le sigh* We have some lovely, lovely plants in the garden this year, and sitting between them and tomato plants is a heavenly scented experience.
The rosemary seems to hate me, however.
I have to ask, though, can you even TASTE one clove of garlic? Admittedly, I adore the stuff and probably use way too much for other people’s tastes, but one clove doesn’t seem to be quite enough for that amount of tomato.
We planted tomatoes for the first time ever this year, and my DH made some sauce with the first few. They are Roma tomatoes — nice and meaty without a whole lot of seeds, but maybe a tad too dry. VERY different from using the pre-canned ones, though! Didn’t have to add ANY sugar. Yaay!
That sounds delicious, but I’ll second what Laurie said about the garlic. One clove for that amount of tomatoes doesn’t sound like nearly enough.
I only have two tomato plants, but it looks like I’ll be getting enough ripe ones in the next week or so for at least one batch of sauce. And my basil needs harvesting as well. Maybe I’ll give this recipe a try. Next year I think I’ll plant a bunch more tomatoes and can some sauce for the winter. I’m sure it would be better than buying it ready made or even than making it from canned tomatoes.
You know, I probably did use at least double that amount of garlic. I was trying to list the recipe from memory. Adjust away!
mmm, that sounds yum. I do a much simpler fresh-tomato sauce, just basically drop cherry or whaddya callems, half-size tomatoes in with the garlic-olive oil and semi-squish ‘em so the juice runs out and makes a thin sauce. add grated Romano at the end. ’sall.
Hey, THAT’S what I can do with the plethora of grape tomatoes that were produced this last week! (Seriously, don’t EVER get more than one grape tomato vine unless you eat them on *everything*. Lesson learned for next year…)
BTW: Anyone got a good recipe for tomato-basil soup? I suppose I can experiment, but I like to have a direction to start in.
Thanks for the recipe! I’m off to the farmer’s market now. But the description of meatballs and sausage-flavoring has me thinking I’ll stop at the meat counter too.
Tomato-basil soup? Don’t have a good recipe, but I’m a fan of the La Madeleine version, with lots of butter and cream. But it’s really too rich; experimentation might be in order.
My mom taught me to use brown sugar (light or dark according to preference) instead of white in tomato dishes/sauces. I like it — it’s a subtle difference, but tasty.
My ma always used brown sugar too, which is what I use when I use *gasp!* commercially canned tomatoes. (Which is about all we use up here in the Frozen Northland, since most of the year fresh tomatoes taste like cardboard. Watery cardboard.)
My Darling Husband recently picked up a flat of Contadina (organic) tomato sauce, and I have to say it is WAAAAAY better than whatever I’ve been picking up at the grocery store! I didn’t have to add any sugar at all, and the sauce had that little bit of sweetness in the background that the DH and I both like. Ma always used Contadina, it sounds like the Italian relatives above were OK with Contadina (if you HAD to used commercially canned stuff), so I guess I’m sold.
Contadina Organic Tomato Sauce…way too much sugar. 4 grams in 1/4 cup.