Cooking Creations

Homemade Pasta Sauce

April 10, 2018 / 44 Comments

A Culinary Experiment

Pasta is a staple food in my family. We eat it at least once a week. I have always wanted to try making my own sauce from fresh tomatoes. Since I’ve decided to try a new culinary experiment every week, this week I attempted this fresh pasta sauce.I had no idea where to start, how many tomatoes I needed or anything. To begin, I looked at a bunch of different recipes online and in my various cookbooks. Since I didn’t really like any of them, I started to pick and choose what ingredients I wanted to use. Tomatoes was a given. I chose to add onion, garlic, zucchini, and some herbs and spices.

Tomatoes on the vine always tasted so much better to me than beefsteak. They have a bolder taste and they just look better, in my opinion. I also chose these because I dream of growing my own tomatoes and these resemble what I would be able to grow. Since I still had no idea how many I needed, I guessed at 15. This ended up being a good number that made enough sauce for about a pound of pasta.

For the first step, I cut the tomatoes into quarters.

Next, I diced a small sweet onion and minced 4 garlic cloves. Using a small amount of olive oil in the bottom of a pot, I sautéed them over medium heat until fragrant. I was very careful not to burn the onion and garlic since I knew this would not taste good in the sauce.

Once the onion and garlic were nice and fragrant, I added the quartered tomatoes, herbs and spices to the pot. I chose to add diced zucchini for some extra nutritional value. It doesn’t really change the taste of the sauce at all so it was purely for extra nutrition. Different people would like different herbs and spices. For my family, I started with basil, oregano, thyme, paprika, chili powder, and nutmeg. I took a potato masher and crushed the tomatoes, then added one bay leaf. Finally, I added a cup of water.

After mixing all the ingredients well, I brought the pot to a boil. Then, I reduced the heat to low and left it to simmer. The longer you can simmer the sauce, the better it will taste. The tomatoes break down over time and the flavors meld together. To let the sauce thicken, leave it uncovered. I checked the thickness every hour or so by stirring the pot.

This is when I started to notice a few of my mistakes. First of all, I should have added more water. After a few hours of simmering, I noticed that my sauce was thickening much faster than I wanted. I would add a cup of water every time I noticed this. Over the course of the 7-8 hours I had it simmering, I added an additional 5 cups of water, totaling 6 cups.

I tasted the sauce when there were a couple hours left before dinner time and it was really acidic. This is from the fresh tomatoes. In order to cut through, I added some sugar. The sugar balanced the taste out really well.

Once I got the taste where I liked it, I decided I wanted to make it into a meat sauce. It would be perfectly delicious without meat, but when I eat spaghetti, I like to add ground turkey. So, I browned the ground turkey and mixed it into the sauce.

Finally, I served the sauce over spaghetti, topped it with a little parmesan, and served it up to my family. I’d have to say that everyone enjoyed it since all plates were wiped clean. My son was making “yum, yum” noises the whole time he ate it and completely abandoned his fork in favor of the two-handed shovel eating method!

I will definitely be making this sauce again and will tweak it slightly each time I do. Next time, I will be adding sugar and more water initially. I might try making some sauce with canned tomatoes as well, simply because I think I would be able to make a larger quantity for cheaper, at least until I can grow some of my own tomatoes!

Have you ever made pasta sauce? What did you learn? What can you teach me?

 

Delicious fresh tomato sauce! Easy to make. The longer you cook it for, the better, it will taste. Toddler approved and husband approved. It passes the clean plate challenge! Prep ahead and freeze, or enjoy right away.

 15 on-vine tomatoes
 1 sweet onion, diced
 4 garlic cloves, minced
 1 zucchini, diced
 1 tbsp olive oil
 1 tsp basil
 ½ tsp oregano
 ½ tsp thyme
 ¼ tsp paprika
 ¼ tsp chili powder
 ¼ tsp nutmeg
 1 bay leaf
 1 -2 tsp sugar (to taste, to cut acidity of tomatoes)
 5 -6 cups water
Optional
 1 lb ground meat (I use turkey)

1

Heat oil in large pot over medium-high heat. Sautee onion and garlic until fragrant (~2-3 minutes).

2

Add remaining ingredients, except meat. Mix well.

3

Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, and simmer (uncovered) for as long as possible. I did about 8 hours. The longer you can simmer, the better it will taste. Stir to check thickness every hour or so. If it starts thickening too quickly, add a little more water.

4

Serve over pasta and top with parmesan. Or use in baked ziti, lasagna, or other pasta dish.

Optional Step
5

Brown ground meat, then mix into sauce right before serving.

Ingredients

 15 on-vine tomatoes
 1 sweet onion, diced
 4 garlic cloves, minced
 1 zucchini, diced
 1 tbsp olive oil
 1 tsp basil
 ½ tsp oregano
 ½ tsp thyme
 ¼ tsp paprika
 ¼ tsp chili powder
 ¼ tsp nutmeg
 1 bay leaf
 1 -2 tsp sugar (to taste, to cut acidity of tomatoes)
 5 -6 cups water
Optional
 1 lb ground meat (I use turkey)

Directions

1

Heat oil in large pot over medium-high heat. Sautee onion and garlic until fragrant (~2-3 minutes).

2

Add remaining ingredients, except meat. Mix well.

3

Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, and simmer (uncovered) for as long as possible. I did about 8 hours. The longer you can simmer, the better it will taste. Stir to check thickness every hour or so. If it starts thickening too quickly, add a little more water.

4

Serve over pasta and top with parmesan. Or use in baked ziti, lasagna, or other pasta dish.

Optional Step
5

Brown ground meat, then mix into sauce right before serving.

Homemade Pasta Sauce
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Lucy At Home UK gentle parenting blogger