If you are going to cook Italian then you must have a good tomato sauce. Tomato sauce is the base of many Italian dishes. Spaghetti and meatballs? You need Tomato sauce. Lasagna, mussels marinara, baked ziti, etc., all require that you start with a good sauce.

Nothing will makes me cringe more than someone using store bought spaghetti sauce in an Italian dish. For those of you outside Italy, New York, and Pittsburgh can somewhat be excused because you probably have never been properly instructed on how to make your own sauce. Fortunately, I have had the pleasure of trying many homemade recipes throughout my years living in New York. I still remember my first Italian food awakening. My father took me to Lombardi’s Restaurant in Gardiner New York. Yes, Gardiner New York, a small town upstate that is blessed with many Italians who moved from the city to live in the suburbs. Mrs. Lombardi made the best sauce I ever had up to that time and from that point forward, sauce from a jar was forgotten.

A good sauce cannot be written down on paper. You must take the basics and add your own creativity to it. With that being said, you need a good place to start. Here is the most basic recipe for Tomato sauce that will get you started.

Ingredients

• 1 Large Onion chopped finely.
• 4-5 Cloves of garlic chopped as fine as possible.
• 2 12 OZ cans crushed tomatoes.
• 2 Tablespoons fresh basil.
• 2 Tablespoons fresh oregano.
• Extra virgin olive oil.

Preparation

In a medium to large saucepan, add olive oil to the pan until the bottom is coated with an 1/8″ of oil. Heat saucepan on medium to medium high until oil is hot.

Add garlic and sauté for two minutes.

Add onions and sauté until almost clear.

Add one can of of crushed tomatoes

Add basil and oregano and stir into the sauce.

Add last can of tomatoes.

Cook until desired taste. This is open for debate. Some people like the taste of the tomatoes when they are cooked for a long time, others like the fresh taste where they have not been cooked for too long. Which ever way you like it, the tomatoes should cook for at least 15 minutes so the flavor of the spices enter the sauce.

Modifications

You can use whole tomatoes from a can instead of crushed and chop them while you stir the sauce, this will make for a more chunky sauce.

You can use fresh tomatoes if you have about an extra hour to spend. Lets face it, 90% of spaghetti sauce in the old days was not made from fresh tomatoes, they were canned otherwise the sauce itself was canned.

You can add meat to this sauce. You can either cook it with the garlic and onions or add separately. If you add it later, it reduces the amount of fat in the sauce as there is less grease. I do not recommend you strain the onions and garlic because you lose the flavor of the “garlicanated” olive oil.

Some Italians I have met put sugar in their sauce. I was never a fan of this. If you want your sauce sweeter, add more fresh basil. Again, it is up to you.

Some people get indigestion from Tomato sauce as it is too acidic for them. You can counter this by adding extra basil which will balance out the ph.

If you want to use this as a marinara sauce, only cook for 15 minutes.