This tomato sauce is made with just fresh tomatoes, onion, butter, and a bit of salt. It is smooth and flavorful and highlights the ripe, fruity flavor of a perfectly ripe tomato. It freezes beautifully, too, making it a great way to extend the flavor of tomato season into the less tomato-y months that fill up the rest of the year by using this sauce on pasta, pizza, or as a base for cooking braised meats.
A low-moisture tomato works best here. Plum tomatoes, Romas, Early Girls, and other fleshy and not too juicy tomatoes will cook down most quickly into a flavorful sauce.
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 1 hour
Total Time: 1 hour, 15 minutes
Yield: 4 to 6 cups sauce
Ingredients:
- 3 lbs. perfectly ripe tomatoes
- 1 onion
- 4 Tbsp. butter
- Sea salt to taste
Preparation:
- Chop clean tomatoes and whirl them in a blender, working in two batches if necessary, until puréed,
- Run tomato purée through a food mill or a sieve (if using a sieve, you will need to scrape the inside of the sieve frequently to move the seeds out of the mesh and let the tomato fall through) into a medium pot.
- Bring tomato purée to a boil. Meanwhile, halve and peel the onion, being careful to leave the root end intact (although trimmed of roots) to hold the halves together. Add onion halves to the pot along with the butter. When mixture comes to a boil reduce heat to maintain a steady simmer.
- Simmer sauce until it has reduced by about a third, has thickened a bit, and turned a pretty deep red, 60 to 90 minutes depending on the tomatoes. Add salt to taste until the tomato flavor pops.
Use the sauce on pasta, in lasagna, on pizza, or whatever else occurs to you!
