Cooking With Dia

First, let me just start off by saying that I grew up calling Tomato Sauce “red gravy”, as most Italian Americans have. It was only until I went off to an all girl Catholic university, when I discovered that the term gravy only pertained to brown gravy. I thought, “Why can’t there be two gravies?” I guess the term red gravy wasn’t posh enough for that preppy school, but I just wanted to be clear that in my heart I still call this red gravy! Of course now that I live in the UK, every time I say “gravy” I get shouted at.

I am not one to conform, but for the sake of the non-Italian Americans who have no idea what I am talking about, I will call this Dia’s Tomato Sauce(really though it’s gravy).

20-25 large plum tomatoes peeled and quartered
6 cloves of garlic (we Italians love this stuff)
15 Fresh Basil Leaves
6 tablespoons of Olive Oil (I prefer
Bertolis)
10 Bay Leaves
1 cup White Wine

Here is an excerpt from my other blog when I first wrote on this recipe:

Today I went out and bought 2kg of fresh tomatoes from the green grocer. “What should I do with these?” I asked myself.
I ended up peeling 20 to 25 large tomatoes, then quartering
them and finally tossing them in my largest sauce pan. I then added some garlic, half an onion, fresh basil leaves, etc and waited over the next three hours for it to simmer down.

After it thickened and simmered I put it into my food processor. Then I strained all of the sauce back into the big pot. I let it thicken and simmer some more, and then added enough sauce in an empty pasta sauce jar (I dumped the store bought sauce out), but before adding it to the jar, I filled the used jar with boiling water and left it for 5 minutes. I then poured the water out and poured the sauce in, tightened the lid and waited for the lid to suction down. Now my sauce will be able to last unrefrigerated for up to a year because it is airtight.

To the remaining sauce in the pot, I added a very small amount of white wine, 1 dried chili pepper, more basil and some pasta. Ten minutes later it was ready to eat. It was the most delicious sauce I have ever had in my entire life. It had a great fresh taste about it. It was miles better than the store bought crap I used to buy, and even better than the sauce I usually make from condensed tomato puree.

If you have the patience to peel, simmer and process your own organic sauce, it is well worth the wait.

Steps for peeling plum tomatoes (incase you never have before):
Take out three large bowls.
In one put all of your plum tomatoes in. Fill this same bowl with boiling water.
After about 20 minutes the skin will start to loosen.
Begin to peel back the tomato skin, and then toss the peeled tomatoes into the second large bowl.
In the third bowl place the skin.
Refer to my step by step pictures above.
If you want sauce faster check out the next recipe!

Dia’s Quick Tomato Sauce

Now if you want to jar at least 6 jars of sauce, these will be your ingredients.

12 Cans of peeled plum tomatoes (Napolini seems to be popular here in the UK, but I prefer Cento or La Valle cans because they usually come with soaked basil inside)
12 fresh Basil Leaves finely chopped (if you don’t have a basil plant, you can use about a tablespoon of dried basil)
6 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil (I prefer Bertoli’s)
1 cup of white wine
5-6 Bay Leaves
4-6 cloves of garlic smashed and chopped

Take out your largest pot and pour all of the tomatoes in.
Next add the olive oil, garlic, basil and bay leaves.
Leave the lid off of the pot for 1 hour and set on 3.
When it comes to a ferocious boil put the lid half on and let it simmer for
1 more hour.
Take the lid completely off and add the white wine, stir and then let simmer
on setting 1 or 2
Get your food processor ready and slowly pour the sauce inside. Blend for 30 seconds and pour back into the pot. If your food processor is teeny tiny like mine, you will have to follow the same process about 4-5 times. So you will need an additional pot to pour the processed sauce into, until it is all finished.

Jarring
Here is a step by step guide to jarring your pasta sauce:
First you need to sterilize your jars and lids, so put them through 1 dish washer cycle.
Next take the jars and lids and place them in your dish basin.
Boil enough water in your kettle to fill the basin, and pour on top of the jars and lids.
Let them cool down before you attempt to pick one up.
Now one at a time pick up a jar and funnel in the tomato sauce. It is OK to fill it to the top, because it will sink back down again.
Tighten the lid and place to the side.
Once you finish this process for all 6 jars
fill up your basin again with boiling water. I’d say 1/2 the way up…
Place all of the now filled jars into the basin, and they will now have a nice
soak which helps preserve the sauce for you.
Go to bed and in the middle of the night you will slowly hear each jar suction down one by one.
This means they are airtight and do not need to be kept in a refrigerator.
They can last for up to a year, but I end up using all of the sauce within the next few months.

©Dia DiCristino