For all that I’ve been getting hoards of farm grown tomatoes for a few summers now, you would think that I would have actually made spaghetti sauce from them.
Not so much.
So when I picked up 25 tomatoes last Thursday, and realized I still had eight from the week before, I knew I had to take drastic measures with my bounty. (I off-loaded about a dozen tomatoes to my SIL, with whom I split my CSA box.)
Upon surfing my trusty recipe sites, I realized that I was going to need to skin and seed my tomatoes. This was going to be a new experience for me, but I had two trusty guides: Mindy at MindyBakes (which could more accurately be called Mindy Does It All In The Kitchen) and Deb at Smitten Kitchen. I also studied their sauce recipes, and these are pretty much the basis for what I made this weekend (and am eating with the kids tonight).
So check out their sites to see how the pros do it. I’m just going to list my tweaks. There are about 1,000 sauce recipes out there, and you probably have your own as well. And for that matter, what I did this weekend will probably change next time I want to make sauce.
I started with 4 pounds of tomatoes, and skinned and seeded them. Blanching them, then throwing them into ice water makes this a breeze. I used 5 cloves of garlic, 1 stalk of celery (chopped), and 1 carrot (grated). We don’t do onions in my house, which I realize is probably blasphemy in some circles. But we just don’t like the way cooked onions taste. If I had had dried oregano, I would have used some of that; as it is I used fresh basil (added at the end) and red pepper flakes.
I froze half the sauce, of course. When you have a bounty of summer tomatoes, you gotta freeze some of those puppies. I don’t can, so I gotta do what I’m able to make them last. Next week, I’ll be roasting whatever I get, and freezing it to make this soup (from Smitten Kitchen). I can’t wait!
Red Pen Mama 