Saturday, 25 January 2025

Tomato soup and sauce recipe.

 I was sure I had previously shared this recipe, but I can't find it so here goes.

Ruffino's Tomato User!

Ruffino was my friends uncle. As  teenager I walked into the kitchen when uncle Ruffie was making sauce and hung out with him for the rest of the day. As his name suggests, he is from Sicily.

A big bowl of ripe tomatoes. The bigger the bowl the better.

1 medium onion diced

1 carrot diced or grated

1 stick of celery diced.

Plenty of olive oil.

Several cloves of garlic chopped or crushed.

1 tablespoon of Italian herbs. Or mixed herbs or Tuscan herbs, or use a bouquet of fresh herbs from your garden.

2 Bay leaves.

Salt and pepper.

1-3 tablespoons Tomato paste/puree. 

1-2 tablespoonful honey or sugar.

Heat your oil in a large pot. Add the diced veges and stir fry until they soften.

Then add the diced tomatoes. You could skin them but I don't bother, I just cut out the hard wee core if they have one. (Any variety of tomato will do, this year I'm using Grosse Lisse and MoneyMakers. Both very tasty varieties, good for salads or cooking.) Also add the herbs, bay leaves  and garlic and stir well. Take a note of how full your pan is, it matters. 

Bring your pan to a gentle boil and allow it to simmer uncovered until it is reduced by one third for soup or 2 thirds for sauce. Give it a stir now and then. I haven't had a sticky one but you never know. Depending on how many tomatoes you have used and how far you wish to reduce the sauce, this can take a long time, allow the whole afternoon.

The more you reduce it the more intense the flavours will be.

Once it has reduced to your liking fish out the bay leaves and add the tomato paste to taste, and also plenty of salt and pepper.

At this point I also add a little honey, sugar or other sweetener. Occasionally I add a dash of Worcestershire/black sauce. Once you are happy with the flavour use a stick blender to whizz it up a bit, for a soup you will want a nice smooth consistency. Sometimes I'll push it through a sieve too. For pasta sauce it's ok to leave it a little chunkier, unless like me, you feed a fussy person who will complain about celery. LOL

This freezes well, and a pal of mine bottles it too.

If you want to use it as a sauce for on your hot chips and sausages reduce it even further and whizz it well to a thick smooth consistency. You may want to tweak your herb mixture for that, adding some cloves.

This is a very forgiving recipe. Add more or less celery or carrots. Use a big onion if you like. I usually check out the fridge and use up any left over bits a pieces, sometimes I add capsicum, today I threw in a few beans from the garden. Extra garlic always works. 

More tomatoes is always better. The Tomatoes are the stars.

I use this sauce whenever a recipe calls for a tin of tomatoes or a jar of pasta sauce. Mixed with mince it makes great Bolognese or lasagna.  


Buon Appetito.

4 comments:

Ma Betty said...

That looks a great recipe Lou and very forgiving, especially if you use a stab mixer.

ButterZ said...

Yummo

Janice said...

That sounds good. I may have to try it.

Denice Barker said...

This sounds very much like my grandma's spaghetti sauce. She was from Sicily, too. Thanks!