A kilo of ripe tomatoes, an onion, two cloves of garlic and half an hour. No tin, no herbs, no stock cube.
It makes about half a litre, keeps five days in the fridge and freezes in portions.
The pinch of sugar is not for sweetness
A quarter teaspoon of sugar against a kilo of tomatoes is far too little to taste. What it does is take the edge off the acidity, which is why almost every commercial tomato sauce contains some.
If your tomatoes are properly ripe you may not need it at all. Taste the sauce before adding it and decide then. Underripe tomatoes, which is most supermarket tomatoes in winter, will need it.
Blend, do not mash
The original instruction was to mash the cooked tomatoes, which with a fork leaves a sauce full of lumps and rolled-up skins. A blender or a food mill gives a smooth sauce in seconds.
Straining afterwards removes the skins and seeds and gives a finer texture, at the cost of a little volume. Leaving them in gives a thicker, more rustic sauce. Neither is more correct.
Ripe tomatoes and nothing else
With four ingredients there is nowhere to hide, so the tomatoes decide the result. Ripe, heavy, deeply red ones make a sauce that needs no help. Pale supermarket tomatoes in February make a thin, sharp sauce that no amount of sugar will rescue.
If good fresh tomatoes are not available, a tin of whole peeled tomatoes is a better starting point than bad fresh ones, and it is what Italian cooks do for most of the year.
Where it goes
- Roast beef in tomato sauce — the obvious destination.
- Stuffed tomatoes — the other way round.
- Macaroni and cheese — a spoonful lifts it.
- Hogao — the Colombian tomato sauce, with scallion.
Tomato Sauce FAQ
To correct acidity, not to sweeten. A quarter teaspoon against a kilo of tomatoes is undetectable as sweetness, and it is why almost every commercial sauce contains some. With very ripe tomatoes you may not need it, so taste first.
Not necessarily. If you blend the sauce and then strain it, the skins come out at that point. If you want to skip the straining, peeling first gives a smoother result: score a cross in the base, drop them in boiling water for thirty seconds, and the skins slip off.
About five days in the fridge in a sealed jar, and several months frozen. Freezing it in portions the size of one meal is more useful than one large block.
Yes, and in winter it is usually the better choice. A tin of whole peeled tomatoes makes a better sauce than pale, underripe fresh ones. Use the same quantity and reduce the cooking time slightly.
Mashing cooked tomatoes with a fork leaves lumps and rolled-up pieces of skin. A blender or a food mill gives a smooth sauce in seconds, which is what the recipe is after.
📖 Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 kg ripe tomatoes (the riper the better; underripe tomatoes make a sharp, thin sauce)
- 1 onion
- 2 cloves garlic
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon sugar (corrects the acidity of the tomato; it does not make the sauce sweet)
Notas
Instructions
- Peel the onion and chop it finely, and do the same with the garlic.
- Heat the oil in a pan over medium heat, add the onion and garlic and cook for about five minutes.
- Wash the tomatoes well, cut out the stem, chop them and add them to the pan.
- Add the salt and the sugar and stir well.
- Cook for 30 minutes, then blend it smooth.
- Strain it if you want to get rid of the skins and seeds, or use it as it is.
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