It also involves a step I've never tried before: scraping the tomatoes against a box grater. This allows you to separate the pulp from the skins and easily discard the skins. (Just be careful to keep your fingers out of the way.)
The recipe comes from Domenica Marchetti's The Glorious Pasta of Italy
, which is quickly becoming one of my favorite cookbooks. I flip through it on a regular basis to find dinner ideas.Simple Tomato Sauce (adapted from The Glorious Pasta of Italy
)Makes about 3 cups
Ingredients
3 pounds plum tomatoes
2 garlic cloves, lightly crushed
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt
Preparation
Cut the tomatoes in half lengthwise, and scoop out the seeds with your fingers. It's easiest to do this over a bowl set next to your cutting board. Once you're done, discard the seeds.
Place a box grater on a cutting board with a moat, and hold the cut side of each tomato half against the large holes of the grater, and grate until all that's left in your hand is the skin. Discard skins. Periodically scoop up the pulp and transfer it to a large bowl so as not to crowd your cutting board.
Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the garlic, and press down on it with a wooden spoon to infuse the oil.
After 2 minutes, when the garlic starts to sizzle but hasn't turned brown, carefully stir in the tomato pulp.
Season with 1 teaspoon salt, raise heat to medium-high, and bring the sauce to a simmer.
Reduce heat to medium-low, and let tomatoes simmer uncovered, stirring occasionally, for 25 to 30 minutes, or until thickened.
Serve with pasta, or use in any recipe that calls for a simple tomato sauce.
Store in fridge in an airtight container for up to 3 days, or freeze for up to 3 months.
Come back tomorrow for a recipe that calls for this tomato sauce.
Do you have a tried-and-true tomato sauce recipe?
17 comments:
I have various sauce recipes. I definitely have slow cook ones, but I also love being able to throw a sauce together. I mistakenly thought it might be a good idea to buy a jarred sauce last week, and that reminded me homemade is always way better!
This sounds and looks awesome! I've never heard of rubbing tomatoes against a grater either, but it looks like it works :)
When you're talking good quality summer tomatoes, simple is all you really need!
This sounds delicious and simple to do! Beautiful photos too!
That looks so good. I make sauce all the time with several more steps involved. Next time I'll try this recipe for sure!
Great idea for a quick and easy sauce that really takes advantage of the good tomatoes that are available now
Like you, I've tried a lot of different tomato sauce recipes out. My mom brought over a huge bag of fresh tomatoes and although I was planning on eating them fresh, you're tempting to make sauce with them!
Ooh this looks delicious. That grating idea is fabulous!
Now that is some good looking sauce. I personally would add a few more cloves of garlic because I love garlic.
I just made this last night! I quartered my tomatoes (skin, seeds and all) and placed them in the sauce pan with one bell pepper (chopped), an onion (chopped), a habanero (seeded and chopped) and a garlic clove. I added 1/2 cup chicken stock and let them simmer for about 15 minutes. Remove from heat, let cool, and blend with an immersion blender. Return to pot and simmer for another 30 minutes. Delicious! And I grew all the veggies, which made it that much better!
I usually just wing it when it comes to tomato sauce, but mine always involves lots of garlic and chili pepper flakes :)
I rarely buy jarred tomato sauce anymore - I almost always make a simple sauce with cherry tomatoes, garlic, herbs, olive oil and white wine! I'm also on a big pesto kick, so my pasta is usually smothered with that. ;)
was this any easier than blanching them to get the skins off? i need a go-to sauce, as i haven't done it very often...
You do the best stuff with tomatoes! I usually go the lazier route and "make" sauce with canned tomatoes but I love how you did this.
You can never have too much garlic! I love the stuff too.
Easier but a little more time-consuming… but when you're done, you just throw the tomato pulp in the pan -- no chopping or anything. Marchetti also says she does it because she doesn't like how the tomatoes can get mushy from blanching.
I still don't really get the whole grating tomato thing, but I'll just have to trust you and Domenica ;)
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