This is about the best pasta sauce I've managed to make at this point in my life. I've yet to find another pasta sauce I like more than it, and every person who's tried it thus far says it's the best pasta sauce they've ever had, so I think it's worth sharing!
An important note:
When it comes to cooking, using fresh organic heirloom ingredients is like cheating. You can replicate this recipe with inorganic, conventional store bought ingredients, though the end result likely won't be as good. That's a fine way to practice making pasta sauce as the ingredients are cheap. However, I hold the opinion that a homegrown or at least locally sourced dinner will always be better than something grown on an industrial scale. I strongly believe in biodiversity and that a lack of diversity in the food we consume could be a recipe for disaster. Unfortunately, many people aren't able to afford a garden; either in terms of time or money. Due to our general lack of public gardens, many people are never exposed to agriculture and never get the opportunity to develop an interest in it. Industrialized agriculture has helped provide the opportunity for more people to worry about things other than food. The latest advances of the age of intelligence will allow more people an opportunity to grow their own food, without spending all their time doing it. Why am I so confident of that? Well, I'm using those technologies to do it, while cofounding a technology startup called Dodgeball.
The step-by-step process:
It all starts with the tomato plants in the garden.
These are tomatoes I've specifically bred for making pasta sauce growing on the vine.
When the vines are ready for harvest, I usually just harvest the ripe tomatoes and leave the vines to continue producing. However, I had an issue with my supports this year (they were toppled by the weight of the tomatoes) and the vines got out of control. So, to get things back under control, I cut them down and started filling boxes.
One of the boxes of tomatoes used in making the sauce.
Here's roughly half of the tomatoes from those vines. This filled eight 32oz mason jars.
The first step is to wash all of your tomatoes to remove all dirt and filter out any that are overripe, underripe or moldy. You'll also want to separate out the best looking tomatoes. The tomatoes that are mushy and overripe go to the worms. The tomatoes that are underripe I put in a cardboard box and let them sit for a while to encourage ripening.
These tomatoes all looked perfectly ripe to me, so I kept them to the side while processing the other tomatoes. You'll see why later!
Next, use a small knife to cut an X in the bottom of each tomato. I find using a serrated knife works particularly well for breaking through the tomato skin with a gentle sawing motion. This X will help with skinning the tomatoes later.
If you come across any tomatoes with imperfections, you'll want to slice them off.
These dark sections will make the skin stick to them if you leave them on, which is a real pain to deal with later.
Here's a couple of notes on selecting tomatoes for making sauce. While you can technically make pasta sauce from any tomato variety, you'll want to use one specifically bred for sauce-making. What makes sauce tomatoes special is their shape, skin thickness, and pulp-to-seed ratio. I breed my tomatoes for additional qualities such as flavor, lycopene, color, bounty, and plant health.
My sauce tomatoes are the result of breeding heirloom black cherry tomatoes with Roma tomatoes. They combine qualities I wanted from both varieties and are in no way perfect... yet. Due to their Roma roots, they have thin skin and a good pulp-to-seed ratio; so, they are easier to process into a sauce, and are larger in size than a normal cherry tomato. Thanks to the black cherry ancestors, they are darker in color, due to their higher levels of lycopene, and more flavorful than a Roma. These tomatoes are indeterminate, meaning they can grow forever; which is perfect if you have a long growing season like I do. They produce large quantities of flowers, meaning each plant is quite productive.
After preparing the tomatoes, in batches, immerse them in a boiling water bath for at least 30 seconds. I find that letting them sit in the boiling water for upwards of 1 minute and 30 seconds works best for getting the skin loose enough to glide right off for easier processing. This is especially true if you're processing large quantities of tomatoes and you only have one pot of water, as the water cools quite quickly.
Take the tomatoes out of the boiling water and dump them into an ice-water bath. I've found that the water doesn't actually have to be ice-cold, just so long as it cools the tomatoes enough to handle with your bare hands during skinning.
Now place your fingers at the top of each tomato (opposite side of the X you cut) and squeeze gently. The skin should glide off. If it is stuck on any part, use your fingers to rip off that section of the tomato skin and consider letting the tomatoes sit longer in the hot water bath.
Optionally, place the skinned tomatoes into a blender. If you would like a chunkier sauce, skip this step and instead place the tomatoes directly into your cooking vessel.
Here's what your work-station should look like. The metal colander with the black rim here is to hold the tomatoes with X's in them that are ready to be processed.
After blending, you'll notice the color of the contents will be much lighter.
Keep processing tomatoes until you fill your cooking vessel to the desired level or you have run out of tomatoes. Avoid filling the pot to the brim; you'll want to leave space to add those tomatoes you separated out earlier. My general rule of thumb is that you'll be left with about %50 of whatever you put into the pot after you boil off enough water to make it thick enough. Many pasta sauces cheat by using a thickening agent such as xanthan gum to avoid cooking off so much water. In essence, this makes their tomatoes "go farther" as you end up with a larger amount of sauce in the end. My take is this: These tomatoes took a lot of time and effort to grow and process; why would we want to do anything but extract the most flavor from them? That would be weak sauce, and we aren't weak sauce!
Now process those tomatoes you set aside from earlier, making one big change....
Don't blend them after they are skinned! Instead either add them whole to the pot...
.... cut them in half, or do both, then add them to the pot.
Next, you'll be adding herbs and spices. Getting this right is a matter of experience. I grow many different varieties of peppers and herbs, so I like to experiment with different combinations. Something important to note is that each pepper variety has its own unique heat and flavor profile. Some peppers hit you "POW", then quickly fade. Some make you say "this isn't that spicy", then induce massive regret in the next five minutes of pain in the back of your throat. And then there are some that produce a gentle and constant burn that imbues your dish with a gentle warmth. Each has its own purpose found through experimentation.
For the powdered Sugar Rush Peach pepper I grew, this is how much I sprinkled in. I just did it by hand and used my best judgement to eyeball it. It takes some time working with a spice to figure out the correct ratio for the desired effect. To zero in on the correct ratio, I use a binary-search algorithm to figure it out, rather than a linear search. If you aren't familiar with those terms, I don't blame you, they are from the computer science field. I'll attempt to quickly explain what they are and why they are important here:
When you are trying to find something, there are a certain number of comparisons you need to do to find that something. Say you're looking for the right amount of spice to add to a dish. When you are looking for the "right" amount of something, you need to try adding different amounts of that something to a dish. When I say "the right amount of spice", it means that level of spice that gives you a sudden spike of capsaicin quickly followed by a perfectly fading, lasting warmth; that level of spice that makes every bite a little exciting. Your definition may differ, and it may differ depending on the dish. Every "try" is a comparison of "Does this current amount equal the right amount"? You can think of all the possible amounts you could try as the infinite set of numbers between zero and infinity; from it could just not be the right spice, all the way to you might as well just eat spoonfuls of that spice as it in its essence is perfect to you. Now, given those search parameters, you can see that it might matter how many tries it takes to figure out how much spice to add; as it could potentially mean forever, which means you'd never find the true answer. That's where the study of algorithms comes in to lend a helping-hand. Some truly brilliant people were able to document the process involved in searching for something; to deduce it to logic and optimize that process. So, with the question "what's the fastest way to find something" in mind, look at the graph above. The various arrows describe the complexity (think of this as amount of time) required to find something depending on the number of things you are searching. The yellow arrow is bad, green is ok, red is great, blue is the dream. Yellow means there's an upper limit to the number of things you can search. Green means that you can search for as long as you want. Red means that you will find an answer within a certain amount of time regardless of the number of things you need to search. Blue means you find the thing on your first try every time. An algorithm is a some set of rules to follow when doing a thing. Most people will search for something using a linear search algorithm; they try adding a bit, then add a bit more, then add a bit more, etc. That algorithm will find something as fast as the green line in the diagram. You will find an answer, but as you can see, you can find an answer faster. That's what a binary search algorithm does; it will find you an answer as fast as the red line in the diagram. Best of all, it's not that complicated to do; here's the best definition I could find: you search by trying the middle amount; if the amount is too much, try half the middle amount; if that is too much, try half of half (a quarter) the middle amount. If an amount is not enough, you try that amount plus half. You keep doing this until you either find the right amount, or have no more halves you can reasonably take; in which case, the amount would be zero. Using this method, you will arrive at an answer faster, which is perfect when you're cooking with ingredients you may be unfamiliar with! You can take this approach to many different aspects of your life and you will find you will be more productive. (Graph Source: https://towardsdatascience.com/linear-time-vs-logarithmic-time-big-o-notation-6ef4227051fb)
Ok, enough nerd-talk, back to the cooking! Here's all of the herbs I added: oregano, and three different types of basil.
Cut off all of the flowers and any tough bits and put them into a bowl or compost them. I like to leave them out on the counter as they smell nice, then compost them when I have fresh cuttings to replace them.
Pluck off all the leaves and chop them up.
Add all of the herbs and a fair amount of olive oil, onion, diced garlic, and salt.
Slowly cook down the sauce over several hours, stirring regularly.
As you can see, by the end of it, you'll be left with roughly half of your starting volume. Serve it fresh or can it for long-term storage. Here's how to can it:
I use this massive pot on two burners when canning at home.
You'll also want a wire rack, a ladle, metal tongs, a canning funnel, and a jar lifter. Optionally, you'll also want a spatula and something to fish out the jar lids.
Fill the pot with water, so it covers your jars and lids.
Get that water boiling (it can take a long time). Then boil it for 10 minutes to sterilize them and soften the rubber on the lids.
After 10 minutes, using the can lifter, remove the jars.
Then, remove the lids.
Take your ladle and canning funnel...
...and fill up each jar.
Then screw on the lids and place them back into the boiling water for 50 minutes.
After 50 minutes take them back out and place them onto the wire rack to cool. The sauce in the jar should be boiling.
You may notice your jars dry with a film on them. This is due to hard water in your pot leaving behind minerals on the surface of the jar. You should let them cool fully, then rinse with water and use a scrubber to remove the film. Here the left jar is pre-treatment; the right bar is post.
Here I compared the color of my sauce to that of a store bought brand. You can see mine is darker in color and has seeds. I like seeds in my pasta sauce. I find that most of the tomato's flavor resides in the gel around the seeds. Some people don't like the seeds as they think they are bitter. I think they add a depth and complexity to the flavor. Be your own judge though; try it both ways and see what you like more.
Mark when this sauce was canned so you can determine if it's still good months and months later.
I use a handheld label printer often whenever I need to add a waterproof, long-lasting, professional-looking label to something.
Name your creation, then make some labels.
Add your labels and you're done!
And remember, tomato sauce isn't just for pasta. It goes well with garlic bread too!
Born and raised in Ojai, where I live with my best friend and wife Mary. I dabble in everything, but startups are my real passion. I believe the only tool fit for every problem is the whiteboard. Documentation defines me and if I don't know it today, I will tomorrow. I am an avid hiker, master gardener, and board-game enthusiast. I am a graduate of the Founder's Institute and recipient of the InterCon Excellence in Technology award. I have worked at companies of varying maturities, from pre-seed to Fortune 500 and am the Co-founder and CTO of Dodgeball, a single platform to unify, manage, and gain insight from your security operations.
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