When I make homemade tomato sauce, it’s usually a 30-45 minute job, involving only one type of tomato product. When I go for the bolonaises and “Sunday gravies,” yeah, we’re talking 3-4 hours of simmering, at the very least. For example, when I make penne all’arrabiata, it’s just tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, and fresh chili peppers (or pepper flakes in a pinch) and then finish with parsley or basil. This is a quick sauce, only simmers for 10-15 minutes.
But it depends what you like. The longer simmered sauces have a different flavor. The tomatoes caramelize and the flavors change from the “bright” and fresh flavors of a short simmered sauce, to more mellow and concentrated flavors of a long-cooked sauce. I tend to prefer the fresh sauces made with a minimal amount of very good ingredients to the long simmered ones, unless they are meat-based.
I much prefer Ragu flavor over its Preggo competitor, which as others have pointed out is too sweet for the liking.
What kind of a name is Preggo, anyways? Is that name supposed to be inspiring our appetites? Or is it supposed to remind expecting mothers via the power of suggestion that they should be having spaghetti.
My ex-wife left me a good recipe for pasta sauce. If I’m not in the mood to cook it, I choose Classico black olive and mushroom and add in some diced tomato and hamburg or meatballs.
I make my own meat sauce. I’ve had Ragu and Prego at gaming nights, but I don’t recall a preference. I think we just got whatever was on sale, and then doctored it.
WhyNot, if what you listed is all the ingredients you use when making a sauce from scratch, then from my perspective you’re missing a few, and that might be why you see them as lacking.
My sauces typically have:
[ul]
[li]LOTS of garlic (and I do mean lots)[/li][li]Onion[/li][li]Basil [/li][li]Rosemary[/li][li]Sage[/li][li]Thyme[/li][li]Marjoram[/li][li]Oregano[/li][/ul]
I also add a bit of red pepper flakes (for a little kick), cinnamon (just a touch), and a bay leaf or two.
And never forget the red wine (several glugs worth) and the olive oil (when browning the meat).
I used to have salt in the sauce, too, but these days I don’t cook with salt, I just add it afterwards to taste, as sometimes I want less or more.
It works well as both a quick sauce (half hour to 45 minutes from starting to brown to eating) and a simmer for several hours sauce. I’ve also been known to add cheese to the sauce, which evens out the acid you can get from tomato. My mom used to grate a carrot into the sauce, which also worked to reduce the acid. I’d do the same, but I don’t keep carrots around.
One tip I’ve heard is to avoid using tomato paste, as for some reason that product is very acidic. These days I use tomato puree, diced and crushed tomatoes.
No, I didn’t mention everything, you’re right. Yours looks exactly like my full bore attempts, with the exception of the sage. Haven’t tried that, and now that you mention it, it is that sort of deep rich woodsy flavor I find lacking in my from-tomato-sauce version. I’ll have to try it again and see if that is it.
But I’m definitely partial to long simmered sauces over light “bright” tomatoey ones, so it may simply be that I’m not patient enough with my tomato sauce version. The jarred spaghetti sauce has already had one very long simmer, while the tomato sauce gets less time on the heat before canning. That’s what I’ve actually felt the difference is, rather than the preservatives.
OK, time for me to own up to being a complete culinary idiot…
I am confused by the various comments to this effect. I can “make” Prego in 5 minutes by following the simple recipe of “1. Unscrew lid, 2. dump in pot, 3. put pot on stove until hot”. I have no idea how to make sauce from canned tomatoes, and I assume it would take a lot longer.
If it really is just as easy, please explain how. To clarify where I’m coming from, spaghetti with sauce from a jar is literally the only food I know how to “cook”. I lived off the stuff in college, and it’s still basically all i eat if my wife is out of town. If I can really make better sauce just as easily (or even close to as easily) for cheaper that would be awesome.
While I’m at it, I don’t understand what “quality canned tomatoes” are. Aren’t they all the same? If not, how do you tell? With fresh tomatoes, I guess I’d look for if they were rotten or something.
Like with anything else. You taste them and decide what you like. Some brands are very weak in tomato flavor. Others are intense, but you also want a nice balance between sweet and acid.
My personal favorite tomatoes are Muir Glen. I actually prefer them to any of a number of D.O.C. San Marzanos I’ve tried, but I haven’t tried all of them. But this is all subjective, so the best thing for you to do is use your senses, buy a bunch of different brands of tomatoes, and taste them to see what you like.
If you like garlic, here’s a very simple tomato sauce recipe. It calls for 2 pounds of tomatoes, but substitute the canned variety. If you want, you can pep it up with a bit of oregano, but I’m not a fan of “everything in the spice rack” pasta sauces. But this is about your tastes, so have at it. I also like to add a bit of anchovy (like 2 or 3) to the olive oil. Use a decent extra virgin olive oil, too. If you don’t want to spend too much money, the Goya brand extra virgin is probably the best bang for buck. If you want to spend a little more, seek out Frantoia.
Muir Glen are very good, but for a less expensive alternative, I like Tuttorosso Crushed Tomatoes in Thick Puree. Both these brands benefit from low heat pasteurization, preserving lots of fresh tomato flavor. Both are minimally processed. Sometimes I will use canned, whole tomatoes, which I will crush by hand then finish with an immersion blender in the pot.
Note that I am the opposite of WhyNot; I like bright fresh tomato sauces if I’m serving a protein on the side, and will go with a long-simmered sauced when I am braising the meat in the sauce. I also prefer only one herb in my sauce…basil if I have fresh, or oregano. I do break from ‘tradition’ (though my Sicilian grandmother did it this way, so maybe the tradition is more regional) and use both onion (shredded on a cheese grater and sauteed in butter) and garlic (sliced thin when I’m in the mood or just minced when I’m rushing). If I put on the water to boil, then start making the sauce, I can get everything in the pot by the time the water boils and the sauce will only cook as long as it takes to cook the pasta.
[ol]
[li]dice a small onion[/li][li]finely chop some garlic (how much is up to you)[/li][li]put onion and garlic in a pan on medium heat with some olive oil[/li][li]when onions soften (about 5 minutes), add (2 14.5 oz. or 1 28 oz.) can(s) of crushed or diced tomatoes and a couple of big spoonfuls of tomato paste; stir until everything is mixed together[/li][li]season with salt and pepper to taste[/li][li]turn down heat to low and let cook for about 10 minutes, stirring often[/li][li]mix in a sprinkling of oregano and basil right before you take off heat (a little dried herb goes a long way)[/li][/ol]
At any point along the way you can add in whatever else you want. If you’re going to add meat, cook it before you add it.
My GF is vegetarian so I’ll frequently throw in some diced eggplant or red bell pepper. I also like it spicy so I liberally apply red pepper flakes. Grated parmesan/romano is a good addition. A splash of wine is good (add it early).
Experiment. It costs less than $3.00 a batch (and it makes quite a lot of sauce).
Nitpick: Not the opposite at all. My default sauce *has *meat in it, along with half the spice drawer. Italian sausage or ground pork at least.
I absolutely agree that if the protein is on the side, a lighter fresher brighter sauce is usually called for. I just don’t generally make that kind of dish.
It actually means more like “I beg”.
It can be used in a few different situations. So when uses as “you’re welcome” it’s more like “no, on, it’s nothing, I beg you not to make a big deal about it” but in a very succinct way.
It’s certainly not “either/or” everywhere, just a general rule of thumb. It seems to me that I most commonly encounter this mixing with Sicilian-Americans, so I suspect, like most food, it’s very regional. Also, the US tradition tends to use a lot more garlic than is called for in Italian recipes. (The garlic tomato sauce I linked to is not your usual Italian tomato sauce.)
American versions of Italian sauces also tend be a lot more heavily spiced (and I also think this may have something to do with the Sicilian tradition, although I’ve never noticed such heavy spice use when researching actual Sicilian recipes. I can’t think of a recipe where I’ve seen more than two or three herbs being used.) For example, I have a book here from Florence with local recipes. One tomato sauce recipe contains these ingredients: tomatato, extra-virgin olice oil, onion, salt, basil. The second contains the same, substituting garlic for the onion. The “rich tomato sauce” is the same as the first with the addition of a carrot and celery to the onion (battuto), as well as pancetta. Nothing fancy, just clean simple flavors, and I find this philosophy is true for most Italian recipes.
This is nearly identical to the way I make sauce. I have only one correction to make, which is: do not add the garlic and onion at the same time. By the time the onion is soft, the garlic will have burned. Cook the onion first, and then at the very end, just before adding the tomatoes, throw in the garlic and let it cook for about 30 seconds or so. Until you can really smell it - definitely no more than a minute.
To make this a meat sauce, do the onions first, then add ground beef (or sausage or whatever you like) and brown it in the same pan. Drain the grease if necessary, then proceed with the rest of the recipe.
Most grocery stores sell an “Italian spice blend” in the spice section that will be perfect for this. (Instead of buying oregano, rosemary, etc. separately.)
Agreed, onions first and when they begin to turn translucent then you add the garlic for just a minute or too. Also, my Sicilian Grandmother would swear at you for not frying the tomato paste in the olive oil with the onions and garlic before adding the crushed tomatoes.
