103 lines
6.3 KiB
Org Mode
103 lines
6.3 KiB
Org Mode
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#+TITLE: Tomato Sauce
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#+OPTIONS: toc:nil num:nil
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#+HTML_HEAD: <link rel="stylesheet" href="../main.css">
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This is a general, all-purpose framework for turning some form of tomatoes into
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some form of sauce. You can use fresh tomatoes or canned (the latter are really
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quite surprisingly good sometimes), and include or omit garlic, basil, or other
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add-ins. The only real non-negotiable ingredients are tomatoes (duh), onion, and
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some kind of fat (I prefer butter).
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* Sauce
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1. *Prep*. If starting with canned tomatoes, skip this step. if starting with
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whole tomatoes (which you should really only ever do if you grew them
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yourself or got them fresh at a farmers market, grocery store tomatoes are
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kinda sad), first, peel the tomatoes. The easiest way to do this is to score
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them with an X pattern cut as shallow as possible while still breaking the
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skin, trying to cover the whole surface area of the tomato, blanch them
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briefly in boiling water, then dunk into an ice bath. After this, the skins
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will slip right off. After peeling, cut out the stem, core, and any green or
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brown bits, and go to the next step
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2. *Base layer*. Couple of variables here, though a perfectly good (in fact, my
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usual go-to) tomato sauce can also skip this entire step:
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- If you want meat with your sauce (pancetta/guanciale/bacon for an
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amatriciana, ground beef or pork for a bolognese) you'll start out by
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sautéing that in some sort of fat (probably olive oil), less fat for meat
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with a lot of fat already in it, to brown and render out fat from the meat
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- If you want onion in the final sauce, you'll chop them finely and sauté
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them with whatever fat you've got (either from the meat, or olive oil or
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butter if you're not making a meat sauce). Remember to always add a *bit*
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of salt when sautéing onion like this, not for flavor but to draw out the
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moisture. If you just want onion flavor but not bits of onion in the final
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sauce, it's added whole later (so ignore this bullet point).
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- If you feel like it (sometimes I do, usually I don't) you can also mince
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garlic here and sauté that in with everything else. Add a little after the
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onion, as garlic cooks slower than onion unless you want something roastier
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(usually you don't for tomato sauce)
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- The traditional (so I'm told) thing to do with amatriciana, but also nice
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with all variations, is to add in a little crushed red pepper with the
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fat to flavor it slightly, but do this late so it doesn't burn
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- If you have tomato paste on hand and feel like using it, it's also nice to
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fry that in the oil for a little bit - usually I'd do that around the same
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time as the garlic
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If you're making tomato *paste* from your sauce, skip all of this - paste is
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an ingredient, not a sauce on its own, so imo should be as neutral as
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possible (i.e. just tomato).
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3. *Tomato layer*. Not a whole lot to do here, just add all of your tomatoes -
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either your peeled and de-cored tomatoes from step 1 if you're using whole
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tomatoes, or an entire can of whole, peeled san marzano tomatoes, including
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the juice in the can - to a pot over medium-high heat. If you need more fat
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or if you skipped step 2, this is where you'd add it - a classic and my
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personal favorite is like 2/3rds to 3/4ths of a stick of butter, but you can
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also go with olive oil. If you skipped the onion in step 2, add that here
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too - usually that'd just be a fist-sized amount of onion or so peeled but
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left with the stem on so you can fish it out from your final sauce later (and
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snack on it!). Also salt here, again not to taste but primarily to draw out
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moisture from the various ingredients.
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4. You can cook that for a wide variety of times, especially depending on how
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hot you make your stove - there ends up being *lot* of liquid in there, so
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you can go (in my experience) a reasonable amount hotter than you expect
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without burning the sauce, though obviously your mileage may vary. The main
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thing you're looking for is the whole chunks of tomato to break down, and the
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whole sauce to get a texture that looks like it'll end up sticking to pasta
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nicely. In all versions of this, stir pretty regularly with a wooden spoon,
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and use the spoon to crush the big chunks of tomato occasionally.
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5. *Final layer*. Usually I don't do anything here - but if you feel
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like it, usually right as you take stuff off the heat is where you'd add
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basil, if you're using it. You can also add sugar to balance out too much
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acidity from an especially acidic tomato here - I'm not going to tell anyone.
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Also salt, but make sure to account for the extra salt you're gonna get from
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the pasta water (see step 6)
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6. *Pasta*. You know how to cook pasta, I'm not going to tell you that. But,
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like, salt your water until it tastes too salty, and remember to move the
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pasta itself *directly* into the sauce pot from the pasta pot before it's
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completely done cooking and without straining, bringing along some of the
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pasta water (and a little extra for good measure) then finishing the pasta in
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the sauce. You know, the thing you do for pasta. Remember the pasta water
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will have salt in it, so adjust for that when salting the sauce overall (I
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have made this mistake and ended up with too-salty pasta sauce).
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* Paste
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Start with the above recipe for tomato sauce, noting especially that (in my
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opinion) you should skip step 2 entirely. Keep cooking the sauce until it's
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*too* thick for pasta sauce (but don't burn it!), then spread it out across some
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sort of lined sheet pan (like a silpat, if you've got one) and bake in the oven
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at like 250-300 degrees for a *hell* of a long time - I've seen this take like
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10 hours, for an especially juicy batch of tomatoes, but obviously keep a close
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eye on it because it *definitely will burn* eventually. You're looking for the
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end result to be the texture of tomato paste, because that's what the recipe is
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for. Especially if you're using garden-grown or otherwise fresh tomatoes,
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you'll notice quite a few seeds in the final product - don't worry too much
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about those, they've never bothered me. Once everything's done and cooled down,
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store in a jar in a fridge, topped with olive oil to seal things off and prevent
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oxidation. Use in all your future endeavors, including the tomato sauce recipe
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above itself. Tomato sauce is a beautiful oroborous.
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