A few weeks ago we were gifted two bottles of some beautiful full-bodied tomato passata made by our dear friend’s Italian family. The sauce was amazing and I absolutely love how local Italian families keep up this wonderful tradition of working together to make many bottles of this amazing ingredient.

I have always wanted to make my own passata, but the convenience of the tinned or bottled variety is very appealing! However, having had our friend’s sauce it has definitely inspired me to have a go.

First up I admit that this sauce in no way compares with the traditional passata we were gifted … but I wanted to create an easy recipe using the abundant supply of tomatoes I was still getting from our garden at the time (the weather has been so incredibly mild!).

I have used roma tomatoes in this recipe as I feel they have the best flavour, and they need to be ripe, so leave them on your bench top for a few days if necessary.

In an effort to replicate the intensity of the sauce we were given, I added extra veggies which I sautéed first, before adding the tomatoes along with some red wine vinegar and maple syrup (the vinegar helps to sharpen the flavour, and the maple syrup helps to cut the acidity).

I cut the tomatoes before adding them to the TM bowl to help control the colour of the finished sauce (I learned from the fabulous Nico Moretti many years ago that if you chop tomatoes at high speed they turn an orange colour … see Nico’s website here ). So the only mixing I do is at the end of the cooking time to help emulsify the sauce a little, and as I don’t like waste I use the whole tomato including the skin and seeds to give the texture and “meatiness” I like.

I have used this sauce alone as a tomato soup (it is amazing with toasted sourdough cheese sandwiches for a light dinner), and as the “passata” sauce when making spaghetti bolognaise (just pan fry your meat first then add the sauce along with extras like wine if you like), covering spinach and ricotta cannelloni before baking, as part of the sauce ingredients in curries, etc. So use this wherever you would usually use a tomato passata or puree.

The sauce will sit happily in the fridge for a week, and can be frozen for up to three months.

Fresh Tomato Sauce

 

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Prep time

10 mins

Cook time

40 mins

Total time

50 mins

 

... before adding to glass jars and storing in the fridge

I have used this sauce alone as a tomato soup (it is amazing with toasted sourdough cheese sandwiches for a light dinner), and as the “passata” sauce when making spaghetti bolognaise (just pan fry your meat first then add the sauce along with extras like wine if you like), covering spinach and ricotta cannelloni before baking, as part of the sauce ingredients in curries, etc. So use this wherever you would usually use a tomato passata or puree.

The sauce will sit happily in the fridge for a week, and can be frozen for up to three months.

Author: Gina @ The Passionate Pantry

Serves: 1.8 litres

Ingredients

• 4 cloves garlic, peeled
• 1 red onion, peeled and cut into quarters
• 1 carrot, peeled and cut into chunks
• 2 sticks celery, cut into chunks
• 60g olive oil
  
  
• 1.2 to 1.3kg roma tomatoes, halved if small, or quartered if large
• 40g red wine vinegar
• 40g pure maple syrup
• 1 tbls sea salt flakes (you may need more later), or 2 tsp fine sea salt
  
  
• 10 large basil leaves (either left whole or torn into pieces)
• sea salt flakes and pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Place garlic, onion, carrot, celery and olive oil into TM bowl and chop 5 seconds / speed 7
2. Scrape around bowl
3. Sauté 10 minutes / Veroma / speed 1 / MC off / basket on top
4. Add tomatoes, vinegar, maple syrup and salt and cook 25 minutes / 100 / speed 1 / MC off / basket on top
5. Add basil and cook 5 minutes / 100 / speed 1 / MC off / basket on top
6. Blend 1 minute / speed 3.5 (ENSURE MC IS IN PLACE)
7. Check for seasoning and add extra salt if needed, and cracked black pepper to taste
8. Blend again for another 10 seconds / speed 3.5
9. Use as desired

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