7-veg tomato sauce | Vegetable recipe | Jamie Oliver recipes (2024)

FAQs

How to make tomato sauce from fresh tomatoes in Jamie Oliver? ›

Tear in the basil (stalks and all). Scrunch in the tomatoes through your clean hands, then swirl a little water around each tin and pour into the pan. Bring the whole lot to the boil, then simmer for 10 to 15 minutes.

Add fresh herbs (basil, oregano, rosemary, bay leaf), and let them simmer to give a punch of fresh flavor.

A generous sprig or two of fresh herbs like basil, parsley, rosemary, or sage can all amp up the flavor of a jarred pasta sauce.

Fresh tomatoes: Try to stick with plum tomatoes, like Roma, San Marzano, and cherry tomatoes. Be sure to peel the tomatoes (and remove the seeds, if you like, but it's not necessary). White sugar: The sugar will balance out the acidity and give the sauce a hint of sweetness.

Tomatoes naturally contain lots of water, so cooking any tomato sauce for a long period of time will help eliminate some of the water content. The water will slowly but surely evaporate, leaving behind a thickened, full-bodied sauce with lots of flavor.

Nutmeg. Nutmeg is the key to boosting earthiness and adding a touch of nuttiness to your spaghetti sauce. Nutmeg also has a slightly sweet flavor, which we know goes great with acidic canned tomatoes. Overall, it accentuates the other ingredients in the sauce and adds complexity.

To make your sauce rich and luxurious, finish it with a pat of butter, a splash of cream or coconut cream, or a spoonful of yogurt, crème fraîche, or sour cream. 13. Swirl in some high-quality olive oil Adding a glug to the sauce just before serving gives it a similar richness and shine to butter without adding dairy.

Tomato sauce has an inherent dilemma: Long-simmered sauces have complex flavor, but simmering over a long period of time cooks out the very thing that makes a ripe tomato so special—its bright, sweet taste.

Southern-cuisine expert and cookbook author Diana Rattray has created more than 5,000 recipes and articles in her 20 years as a food writer. In a salad or sandwich, you don't need peeled tomatoes. But, if you're making a fresh tomato sauce or stewed tomatoes, the tomatoes should be peeled, cored, and seeded.

Should I peel tomatoes for sauce? ›

To ensure a uniform, smooth texture. Tomato skins are tough and hard to chew, so removing them before you make sauces – especially canned sauces – is important. Avoid bitter flavor.

Most tomato sauce recipes are based on canned tomatoes, and canning companies carefully regulate the pH level of their products. So, the need to add sugar to tomato sauce is declining, but there may still be exceptions. It's best to make your sauce without sugar at first, then taste it and add a pinch if necessary.

Add butter

Yes, that's right. Toss in a few tablespoons of butter, and let it melt into the sauce. If you've never tried it before, it might seem strange, but a little butter makes tomato sauce rich and smooth, and also balances out too much acidity, which is common in jarred sauces.

The reason for sprinkling a pinch of sugar into a simmering saucepan of tomatoes is simple: sugar cuts the acidity of the tomatoes and creates an overall more balanced sauce. The exact acid levels in tomatoes can vary quite a bit depending on whether they're fresh or canned, the tomato variety, and the time of year.

"Lemon zest adds a brightness," he told me. "Without adding additional acid (already provided by the fresh tomato).

In a salad or sandwich, you don't need peeled tomatoes. But, if you're making a fresh tomato sauce or stewed tomatoes, the tomatoes should be peeled, cored, and seeded. The result will be a smoother sauce without any seeds, core, or peel in it. Don't worry, it's an easy and quick process.

Yes, you can leave skin on tomatoes when making sauce! Just use a food processor to transform whole tomatoes into sauce. This saves lots of time from having to boil the tomatoes first to loosen the skin enough to peel. We also figure keeping the skins on retains all the vitamins and minerals that the skin contains.

You CAN make tomato sauce without removing the peels first, but if you want a smooth sauce that doesn't contain any bitterness from the peel then I would take the 20 minutes or so to blanch and peel the tomatoes first.

Fresh tomatoes are a natural substitute for canned crushed tomatoes, but it takes a few steps to transform them for your recipes. You can use any type of tomato, but for ultimate flavor and a less watery texture, use paste tomatoes like Roma or Amish Paste.