Marinara time

I know, I know, I promised this about a week ago. But it's worth the wait, really.

I never had any real desire to make my own pasta sauce, being perfectly happy with what came in jars. Newman's Own Bombolina was the winner in our house, mostly becasue H preferred it. I'm partial to a sauce with mushrooms, but he doesn't like mushrooms. I'd rather not hear about it than fight for mushrooms, so I probably haven't had sauce with mushrooms in years.

Back to the sauce-making. So we were fine with jarred, but the last time we were in Eastern Europe, we discovered they have a completely different idea of what should go on noodles and pizza. The sauce is somehow both sweeter and more peppery than we're used to. They also are still figuring out pizza, often throwing things like corn and ham and sardines and goat cheese together, so I was motivated to make a pizza that tasted good.

The recipe I am using is somewhat based on the one in "A New Way To Cook"

I tend to triple this recipe, then freeze it in one meal-portions for later use.

Get your big pot out. Put 2 tablespoons olive oil in it and turn the heat to a medium lowish. Chop up a medium red onion and a few cloves of garlic. I only use two, but some people might like more. Fry them in the hot oil for about six minutes.

Open one 28 oz can of peeled plum tomatos, then seed and chop them. I use my hands to seed them. I don't even know of any other way. Empty one 28 oz can of tomato puree, and half a can of tomato paste into the pot, along with the seeded chopped tomatos. Stir. Then I add a few teaspoons basil, a few of oregano, two teaspoons sugar, and about half a cup of red wine. A cabernet or a burgundy works just fine for this. Add one teaspoon of salt, and then just simmer at a low heat until dinnertime. I often adjust the spices as I'm cooking, so I apologize for not having exact measurements.

I did make this completely from scratch one time, peeling and seeding my own plum tomatos, no puree or anything. It took FOREVER to reduce the tomatos to a sauce, and just was not worth it to me.The above will taste delightful in about 30 minutes of simmering.

One nice thing I've noticed from this is I don't get the swollen tounge from the tomatos when I make my own sauce. Eating fresh tomatos swells my tounge and makes it even bleed sometimes, and so did eating jarred sauce. Even though I'm using canned tomatos and canned puree, I don't have this efffect with the homemade stuff.

Make sure you use Italian Plum tomatos grown in Italy. And your puree should have one or two ingredients, tomatos and salt. If you can find it without salt, even better. I can't remember if that's possible, because I've been here too long, but I'll find out when I get home.