Saucey Tomatoes

So tonight I found myself in the position of really wanting to make something, but having next to nothing in the refrigerator or the pantry. I've been aching for a while now to make another batch of tomato sauce, and the only thing I have plenty of are tomatoes. It's getting down to the tail end of the harvest, though, so I figure I should take the chance to make some sauce now while I can. I just started making my own sauce from fresh tomatoes this summer. I started from a very basic Joy of Cooking recipe, and have adapted the general principles to every new batch based on my mood and supplies. The backbone of the sauce is this: Sauteed onions, carrot, celery, and garlic with a selection of herbs, be it basil, rosemary, thyme, sage. My personal favorites are the rosemary and thyme. Then add 2 or so lbs of tomatoes, and a dash of salt and pepper, all simmered together for 10 or 20 minutes.

Tomato sauce can start out with butter or olive oil. I tend to like butter better, but that's in part because I find onions easier to saute in that than oil. I like to put a lot of herbs in, and I usually let it simmer for closer to a half an hour so that all the flavors from the herbs can be fully released into the sauce. On general principle, I think the more variety of vegetables you can include the better. I also almost always use a little bit of brown sugar at the very end of the process: a lot of times the tomatoes I am using are really ripe, and can be a little acidic which is tempered by the sugar. You can peel your tomatoes, but I prefer the texture of the skins, and also it's a lot less work in the kitchen. To get the seeds out I've developed a method of simply cutting my tomato in half and then squeezing the seeds out. This can be a little messy, but if you're willing to take a minute to clean up after, the process is actually quite satisfying. Other fun additions: wine, whiskey, hot peppers, olives, cream (added after the sauce is cooked, and just before serving), and any variety of adventurous herbs, maybe curry or old bay.  What I made tonight was very simple, and thrown together with the few remnants of food left in the house. Just a note, I didn't have any onions, so didn't use them and the sauce was fine. If you have them, though, use them.

Spontaneous Tomato Sauce
3T. Butter
1 stalk celery, thinly sliced
3 large cloves of garlic, minced
4 big mushrooms, coarsely chopped
A few large pinches of fresh rosemaryPinch of dried sage
A few sprinkles of salt
2 lbs. fresh tomatoes, coarsely chopped with some of the seeds and liquid squished out
1 cup of red wine
2 T. light brown sugar

In a large saute pan, start melting the butter. Add the sliced celery, cooking for a minute. Then add the garlic, cook for 30 seconds to 1 minute. Then, pile in the mushrooms, along with salt, and herbs. Let cook for a few minutes (maybe 5) until everything turns brown and fragrant. Then add your tomatoes. I let them sit and simmer for 10 minutes, then added the red wine. I let the mixture sit again for another 10 minutes, covered, to get it well stewed; then a final 10 minutes uncovered to let some of the liquid escape. In these last 10 minutes, add the brown sugar.

To get the sauce really smooth, I run it through a food processor or use a hand mixer. First, though, I dump the sauce in a bowl and have it sit in the freezer for a bit until it comes down to a workable temperature and the splatters won't burn me (learned that lesson the hard way). You can serve it immediately, but I've been making the sauce and freezing it. You can keep it in the refrigerator for up to 4 days, or frozen up to three months.