Mom’s Tomato Sauce
by Francesca Patterson
If there is one guaranteed way to cheer me up, it is the comforting smell of homemade tomato sauce filling my home. I think that everybody claims their family’s spaghetti sauce to be the best ever, but I know for sure that my mom’s sauce is truly unparalleled. As a child, I would turn my nose up at all other sauces because of this one. It is so simplistically flavorful, as most of my favorite meals are. All the fancy sauces from restaurants could never compare to this one. I was so glad to have fresh roma tomatoes from Norman’s stands to completely elevate this recipe. They are so sweet, they almost do not require any added sugar at all. The sugar in this recipe is used just to add a slight contrast to the acidity of tomatoes.
This pasta sauce is straight-forward, you could easily chop this up and throw it on the stove while you do whatever else you need to in the hour or two it cooks. Trust me, everyone in your house will be craving the aroma it creates. A warning, any company you have over for dinner may start demanding samples of this sauce before it is ready. Since this is completely vegan and just three fresh ingredients, it freezes very well. I have found that it works best when the sauce is frozen in portions, such as in sandwich bags or small containers. This way, you can thaw out just as much as you need for the time being. This sauce is ideal of any kind of pasta, but also a great topping for pizza or other dishes (such as my stuffed eggplant recipe)!
INGREDIENTS
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2 lbs of Roma tomatoes (peeled and chopped)
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a few sprigs of fresh basil
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1/8 of medium yellow onion (thinly sliced)
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1 tsp of sugar
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salt
DIRECTIONS
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Fill a medium sauce pan with water and bring to a boil. Drop tomatoes in boiling water for two minutes or until the peel has cracked. This will make it easy to peel the skin from the tomatoes and chop them up.
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Add two tbsp of olive oil to a sauce pan. Saute onions until they are translucent, being very careful not to burn the onion.
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Add tomatoes and basil, salt to taste, and a teaspoon of sugar. Simmer for about an hour and a half to two hours.
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Put sauce through a blender or food processor to make it smooth. Add salt to taste preference.
