My Own Marinara Sauce

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I am still flying high from the great success with my Victorio Food Strainer, which is all I could blog about yesterday!  🙂  I had several choices what to do with the 10 cups of tomato puree that I got from the first batch of tomatoes that I processed.  It isn’t a great amount, so I knew it wouldn’t be worth canning sauce or juice.

However, my brother John, and his wife Jeanne, and their girls, Cathy and Stephanie are coming for a visit next week.  I plan to make Italian Burgers this weekend and I knew that a fresh marinara sauce would be just the thing to add to the filling as well as for dipping!

Italian Burgers

“Marinara” actually means sailor-style sauce.  There are at least two folk theories as to the origin of this sauce: One says cooks aboard Neapolitan ships invented marinara sauce in the mid-16th century after Spaniards introduced the tomato (a New World vegetable) to Europe. This meat-free sauce was easy to make and resisted spoiling due to the high acid content of tomatoes. This made it ideal for lengthy sea voyages hundreds of years before refrigeration methods were invented.   The other theory for this unusual named dish refers to the fast, fresh sauces (which usually contained onions and tomatoes) that the wives of Neapolitan fishermen would prepare from their husbands’ catch of the day.

Regardless of the origin, making my own marinara sauce has spoiled us from ever wanting the sauce that comes from a jar!  My marinara recipe is parts and pieces of recipes that have given me mixed results.  You can adjust the amount of each ingredient up or down based upon how much sauce or puree you start out with.  If you want to make your own Marinara but don’t want to start from a garden tomato you can easily start with tomato sauce from a can — you will still end up with something tastier than canned marinara!

I wish you could taste this sauce.  It is the very best I have ever made and I can’t wait to share it with my family.  Have fun!  I sure did!

**My Own Marinara Sauce
**

by Catherine

10 cups fresh tomato puree
2 Tablespoons parsley (dried)
4 cloves chopped garlic (2 teaspoons minced)
1 teaspoon oregano
1 teaspoon kosher sea salt
½ teaspoon ground black pepper
3 Tablespoons olive oil
½ cup finely chopped onions
1 cup white wine (whatever you have on hand)

*Heat oil and saute’ garlic and onion until soft and golden (be careful not to burn.)

Stir in all other ingredients.

Simmer, do not boil, until the sauce is your desired consistency.

Homemade Marinara Sauce

Notes:
*   Most generally I would use a dry white wine, like a Chardonnay, but I have even used Moscato, which is a sweet dessert wine and it was great!

*   I simmered 10 cups of juice/puree about 7 hours and ended up with 1 quart of marinara.  That may seem like a long time but it isn’t much work and the truth is I ended up with a marinara sauce that is so much better than anything you can buy.

*  This recipe is a compilation of several marinara recipes that I have tried.  To me this is the best mix of ingredients for a deliciously rich and hearty sauce.

Selecting vegetables Whether in your supermarket’s produce aisle or at your local farmers’ market, fresh vegetables should look firm, plump, and as if they’re bursting with life.  Avoid those that are dried out, bruised, discolored, or overly soft.