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Question by Aaron: Can anyone make good pasta style tomato sauce without canned items?
I’m looking to make a good tomato sauce without the aid of canned ingredients (i.e., crushed tomatoes or tomato paste from a can), yet every recipe I find calls for canned tomatoes in one or more forms. I figure I should just buy the made sauce if I am going to be buying cans anyway, but that is exactly what I would like to get away from, cans. Thanks for your help.
Best answer:
Answer by Photo Student
Fresh Tomato Spaghetti Sauce
* 4 lbs fresh tomatoes, chopped & peeled
* 2 medium onions, chopped
* 4 cloves garlic, chopped
* 1/4 cup fresh basil, chopped
* 1/4 cup olive oil
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 4 sprigs parsley
* 1 tablespoon sugar
* grated parmesan cheese (you can use Romano if you wish)
1. To cook pasta sauce, heat olive oil over medium heat in a large iron skillet or heavy saucepan.
2. Add onion, basil, garlic and salt.
3. Saute until onion is tender, approximately 5 minutes.
4. Add tomato, parsley and sugar; heat to a boil; reduce heat and simmer, uncovered for about 2 hours, stirring often or until sauce has thickened.
5. Remove parsley.
6. Serve over cooked spaghetti or other Italian pasta and top with Parmesan cheese.
Basic Marinara Sauce
2 large yellow onions, peeled and diced
2 Tbsp olive oil
5-6 cloves of garlic, minced (about 2 Tbsp)
2 Tbsp dried herbs (basil, oregano, rosemary, thyme, etc)*
1/2 cup red wine
12 cups peeled and seeded fresh ripe tomatoes**
salt and pepper to taste
In a large soup pot, heat up the olive oil. Add the onions and cook slowly, on medium heat until they start to caramelize. They should be evenly brown and soft. Cooking them this way brings out the natural sweetness in the onions. Add the garlic and dried herbs and cook for 5 minutes. Deglaze the pan with the 1/2 cup of red wine and cook for 2 minutes more. Add the tomatoes and their juice and stir to combine. Bring to a simmer and cook on low, stirring occasionally for about 2 hours. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!
It’s a good thing you’re trying to avoid canned tomatoes; there has been a study that the lining of several canned tomato brands have harmful linings[1]. Instead of canned tomatoes, you could buy tomatoes in a bottle, possibly of your favorite brand, and it should work just as good.
Buy some fresh tomatoes with substance (eg. beefsteak or roma work best). You’ll have to take the skins off them, but that’s easy. Take a big pot of water and bring it to a boil. Drop the tomatoes in for no longer than 60 seconds. Take them out and the skins will slide off very easily.
For the sauce…
In a large pot, add enough olive oil to just cover the bottom of the pot. On medium heat, throw in some onions and chopped garlic and cook until their tender. Add the tomatoes and anything else you want in your pasta sauce. Chopped green/red/yellow peppers, mushrooms, cooked ground beef/pork, basil, salt and pepper. Pasta sauce is super easy and there’s no wrong way of doing it. Simmer on medium low for 90 minutes giving it a good stir from time to time.
Good luck!