Every cook needs a good basic tomato sauce base. This forms the foundation for so many recipes: pizza, tomato based pasta, sauces for meats or fish. Learn this well, adapt with other flavours to make it your own and you can form literally hundreds of new recipes!
Here’s my basic tomato sauce. It’s not rocket science but it tastes, simply, good.
Ingredients (makes circa. 4 cups of sauce)
1 small white onion
5 cloves garlic
3 x 400g tins of good quality plum tomatoes
1 handful (200g) cherry tomatoes, sliced in half (optional – I like these for the freshness they add, but it works okay without it)
1 bunch fresh basil
Sea salt and black pepper
Olive oil
Optional: 1 small handful of fresh, chopped oregano. Good if using this for pizza sauces.
Method
1. Dice the onion and saute in a saucepan on medium heat with olive oil for circa. 5 minutes until soft and translucent.
2. Add the garlic and saute for a further 2 minutes until the garlic is cooked through.
3. Add the tinned and fresh tomatoes and simmer on low heat for circa. 15 minutes.
4. Roughly slice, or tear, the basil and add to the sauce. Stir through with a large pinch of sea salt and freshly grated black pepper.
If serving as a sauce for meat or fish and presentation is important, at this stage you can blend then sieve so it’s silky smooth. Frankly, I miss this latter stage out often.
