Six Vegetable Marinara Sauce
Have you ever made your own pasta sauce? It’s not as difficult as you might presume and it makes a world of difference compared to jarred sauce. My husband’s best friend’s family is 100% Italian and they’re all amazing cooks. In a recent conversation, Antonio threw out the idea of having a Sauce Off. That’s all I needed to hear. Cooking with one of the best families anyone could possibly know. Enjoying good food and drink together. And turning it into a fun competition? You don’t have to ask me twice! We coordinated a date, figured out who was entering their sauce (there were four of us), and I organized the details. I made Sauce Off T-shirts and official voting cards. Michelle found a cool winner’s apron on Amazon. We cooked and ate pretty much all day and we celebrated with homemade limoncello, compliments of Annalisa. Take a look at the pics below. Maybe you’d enjoy doing something similar with your friends? When it came time to choose what sauce I was going to enter I wanted to make something a little different. I always love sneaking veggies into recipes and I managed to get six of them into this one. The tomatoes, onion, garlic, red bell pepper, carrots, and celery add a depth you won’t get from a traditional marinara. Speaking of tomatoes, if you’re going to take to the time to make a homemade sauce you want to use the best tomatoes. That’s San Marzano and if you can find DOP certified, even better. Believe it or not, not all San Marzano tomatoes are created equal and DOP certification guarantees that a tomato is of the San Marzano variety. Regardless, when buying your tomatoes, San Marzano, San Marzano, San Marzano, unless you’re growing them in your garden. That’s a whole other conversation we could have but not everyone has a garden so we’ll stick to canned. Ok, now that we moved past tomato choice, the last thing I did was add a little heat with some red pepper flakes. I use ¼ teaspoon which gives it a little kick but if you’re into spicy foods you can always use a little more. When you want something a little different than your ordinary sauce, this one has a great texture (a little chunky) and a unique flavor. I'm proud to say it tied for second place. I'll take it!
Recipe for Six Vegetable Marinara Sauce:
Ingredients:
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
4-5 cloves garlic, peeled and halved
½ yellow onion, finely chopped
1 red bell pepper, finely chopped
2 medium carrots, finely chopped
¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes
½ teaspoon kosher salt
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons tomato paste
2 cans 28 ounce whole peeled DOP certified San Marzano tomatoes
½ tablespoon sugar
2 stalks celery
6 sprigs basil
Directions:
In a 3 quart saucepan melt the butter and extra virgin olive oil over medium heat. Add the garlic, onion, bell pepper, carrot, and red pepper flakes. Stir in the salt and pepper and cook until they soften and the onions turn translucent about 5 minutes.
Add the tomato paste and cook one more minute, stirring the whole time. Add the whole peeled tomatoes and crush them with the back of a spoon.
Stir in the sugar, celery, and basil sprigs. Bring to boil then reduce to simmer until it thickens, stirring occasionally, about two hours.
Discard the garlic, celery, and basil before serving.
