FRESH TOMATO SAUCE

The sauce was made from the first bucket of this year's assorted tomatoes from our garden. My husband just brings up a couple buckets of vegetables about mid afternoon and there they are on the counter and I have to do something with them. When we were younger I used to resent it - but now I look forward to the daily challenge dealing with the garden's bounty. I like the surprises best, like this first bucket of tomatoes.

This is a lovely tomato sauce and it is ready in 30 minutes. Fresh tomatoes make an exceptionally good sauce. I love the yellow fleshed low acid variety; they are not likely to cause heartburn.

 

Large tomatoes can be peeled and crushed. More than half of the tomatoes I used were cherry tomatoes and I just put them through the blander. Some people say tomato skins make the sauce bitter, but I didn’t detect any bitterness. In any case this sauce was not meant for preserving. 

FRESH TOMATO SAUCE 

2 pounds of fresh tomatoes [I used a mixture of cherry and low acid tomatoes]

2 Tbsp olive oil

1 carrot, peeled and thinly sliced

4 cloves of garlic

basil and oregano [you may use dried herbs]
2-3 sprigs of fresh, flat leaf parsley, chopped

salt to taste

1-2 tsp of sugar, depending on the tomatoes acidity

 

• Take the stems and leaves off the fresh tomatoes and wash them well.

• Cut out the large centers and discard.

• Chop the tomatoes and place them in a blander or food processor and puree.

• Place a non stick skillet on medium heat.

• Add the olive oil and the carrot slices and lightly sprinkle them with salt.

• Sauté the carrots for 2 minutes, stirring often.

• Add the garlic and continue to sauté until the garlic is translucent. Do not burn.

• Add the tomato puree and slowly cook on medium heat for 25 minutes.

• Add the herbs and sauté for 5 minutes longer. The sauce is ready when the oil floats to the top.

• Adjust the salt. If you started out with canned tomatoes instead of fresh ones there might be plenty of salt in the sauce already.

• Taste and add sugar to the sauce gradually and sparingly, the sauce should not become sweet. But even low acid tomatoes require a bit of sugar.