Tuesday, October 25, 2011

A Sauce for All Seasons

A few weeks ago someone asked me about homemade tomato sauce.  Got me thinking about it, so I thought I'd share it.  Please keep in mind this is a variation of Alton Brown's "Seeing Red".  Yes, there is an exact recipe, which I followed the first time, but since then I just shoot from the hip.  Measurements are not exact, but rather to taste...
"Mr. Brown I presume"
Ingredients:
  • 2 White Onions (diced)
  • 6 Stalks Celery (diced)
  • 6 carrots (diced)
  • 7 cloves garlic
  • three Large cans whole tomatoes
  • 1 tsp dry basil
  • 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
  • 1 tbsp dry oregano
  • 3 bay leaves
  • 3 tbsp capers
  • 1/3 cup white wine
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
  • 1/2 cube butter
  • olive oil
  • 1/4 cup butter
  • 1/4 brown sugar
  • salt
  • pepper
Open up cans of tomatoes and pour contents into a strainer over a pot (you want to keep all the juice) Try to remove all the seeds from each tomato, this is a time consuming task, but seeds don't taste good so...discard.

Place all the juices along with seasonings into a pot and reduce liquid by half over Med-High heat.

In a large oven proof pan, sweat the onions, celery, carrots, and garlic with olive oil...about 10-15 minutes until tender...then add the tomatoes and capers.  Mix it around so everything is incorporated and then  
Place in oven under your broiler.  When things start to brown five them a stir every 4-5 mintues...do this for about 15-20 minutes.  Watch carefully as they can burn fast.
salt 'n' pepa
 Remove from oven and de-glaze pay with the white wine...move everything to a large pot, add reduced liquid, butter, and brown sugar. Hit it with a blender stick until smooth.  add Salt and Pepper to taste. 
This can be used for just about anything italian, pasta, lasagna, I use this to simmer my meatballs, pizza, etc.  I also have used this as a base to make a tomato cream sauce, the ideas are endless, or at least have a slight potential to be endless...you can even make Chili?  Really?  Yes...really...but that is another blog ... did I mention it freezes well.  Once batch will last us a long time.

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