Is It Marinara Or Is It Tomato Sauce?

Either Way, It's NOT Gravy

It's been another bountiful summer for my small garden plot of Roma tomatoes. Too bountiful if you ask me...or my neighbors and friends. Or my barber. Or my mail carrier. Or total strangers driving by my house who run the risk of having me throw tomatoes through their open car windows. Anyway, it's time to make sauce again! But will it be marinara or tomato sauce? “Wait,” you ask, “there's a difference?” Oh, yeah.

Marinara is what most Americans think of as “spaghetti sauce.” But, for heaven's sake, please learn how to pronounce “marinara.” I don't know when, why, or how Americans started saying “mare-uh-NARE-uh.” I don't remember most people pronouncing it that way when I was a kid, but they do now and it drives me nuts. Sometime over the past fifty or sixty years this offensive mispronunciation has taken hold and it simply makes my skin crawl. It has the same effect on me as nails on a blackboard, especially when I'm assailed by it in so-called “Italian” restaurants. “So you want the mare-uh-NARE-uh with that?” Uffa! Che schifo! PLEASE eschew the flat, nasal and completely incorrect American pronunciation and use instead the rich, round authentic Italian “mah-ree-NAHR-ah.” Grazie mille.

I tend toward marinara because it's a simpler preparation and generally more useful for my purposes. Marinara is a quick-cooked sauce. Because of the shorter cooking time, it retains its bright flavor and vibrant red color. It's also a thinner sauce and it's a little more on the sweet side with just a hint of tartness. It lacks the depth of a longer cooking tomato sauce, but it's my go-to sauce for pizza and for simple dishes like spaghetti al pomodoro.

I said it's “quick-cooked,” and it's just that. I have a recipe here from Italian-Canadian chef David Rocco for a so-called “five minute” marinara sauce, something of a misnomer since the sauce actually takes about fifteen minutes to prepare and cook.

1 medium onion, chopped

1 clove garlic, chopped

4 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

1 (28 oz) can San Marzano tomatoes, pureed

pinch dried red chili flakes

4 or 5 fresh basil leaves, torn

Salt

In a large saucepan, heat olive oil and add onions, garlic, and chili flakes. Sautè for 2 or 3 minutes. Add pureed tomatoes and simmer over low to medium heat for 10 minutes. Salt to season. Add basil in the last minute or two.

On the other end of the “quick” spectrum, here's a recipe from Rocco DiSpirito for his mama's marinara. This one takes about an hour, so it kind of straddles the line between quick-cooked and long-cooking:

1/2 yellow onion, finely chopped

3 cloves garlic, crushed or minced

3 tbsp olive oil

2 (28 oz) cans San Marzano tomatoes, crushed

1 tbsp tomato paste

1 cup chicken stock

1 cup water

1 tsp sugar

pinch of red pepper flakes

Kosher salt and freshly-ground black pepper, to taste

a few leaves of fresh basil, torn into small pieces

In a sauce pot or Dutch oven, heat the olive oil over medium-low heat and add onion. Cook for about five minutes before adding garlic. Cook an additional five minutes, or until onions are translucent and garlic is lightly golden. NEVER allow garlic to brown!

Add in the tomato products. Add the chicken stock, water, and sugar. Taste and season with salt, pepper, and red pepper flakes. Cover and bring to a simmer.

Simmer the sauce for about an hour, adding in the fresh basil during the last ten minutes or so of cooking time. The sauce will be fairly thin. For a thicker sauce, simmer uncovered until the sauce reduces to desired consistency.

Now, on to tomato sauce.

In classic French cooking, Sauce Tomat is one of the five foundational “mother sauces.” The French preparation varies from its Italian cousin in that it is generally thickened with a roux, a mixture of flour and fat (usually butter) and it also includes some kind of roasted or cured meat, like ham or bacon, which is rendered in for additional flavor. The French technique often employs chicken or beef stock to add to the depth, along with the aromatics, which, in French tradition, are called mirepoix rather than soffritto. And, of course, the French use less of those base Italian seasonings like garlic and basil and oregano. Lah-te-dah.

Anyway, this is a simple recipe for good old Italian tomato sauce.

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 small onion, finely chopped

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 stalk celery, finely chopped

1 carrot, finely chopped

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 (14-ounce) can diced tomatoes

1 6 oz can tomato paste

1/2 tsp Italian seasoning

1/2 tsp parsley

2 basil leaves, finely chopped

2 dried bay leaves, whole

1/2 tsp brown sugar

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, optional

In a large stock pot, heat oil over medium high heat. Add onion and sauté until soft and translucent, about 2 minutes. Add garlic and cook for an additional minute. Add celery and carrots and season with salt and pepper. Sauté until all the vegetables are soft, about 5 minutes.

Add juice from canned tomatoes by pouring through a strainer, then crush tomatoes and add pulp. Add tomato paste and seasonings and simmer covered on low heat for at least 1 hour or until thick.

Remove bay leaves and check for seasoning. If sauce still tastes acidic, add unsalted butter, 1 tablespoon at a time to round out the flavors.

If not using all the sauce, allow it to cool completely and pour 1 to 2 cup portions into plastic freezer bags or other freezer-safe containers. This sauce will freeze well for up to 6 months.

As you can see, a little more goes in to creating a tomato sauce. For one thing, you always use a soffritto of onion, celery, and carrot. This adds a depth of flavor and a natural sweetness.

The real secret to this layered, complex flavor, though, is the longer cooking time. A long simmer, usually for at least an hour if not two, will really allow for a deep flavor and a rich texture to develop in a way quick cooked sauces can't match.

While a light marinara is perfect for pizza or quick, simple pasta dishes, the heavier, heartier tomato sauce is great for something like lasagne or cacciatore or bolognese that require longer cooking and a sturdier sauce.

Now....(opening a can of worms) about “gravy.”

I like to attend local Italian street festivals. They're great fun, even though they're not always strictly Italian in nature. For example, the Festa Italiana I went to most recently featured a karate demonstration. Hey, nothing shouts “Italian!” like a good dojo. But, by and large, they really do showcase the heart of Italian-American culture.

You know how I could tell it was Italian-American rather than Italiano vero? I could tell because I saw a nice middle-aged couple walking around wearing matching t-shirts they had just purchased from one of the vendors. The shirts said “It's Not Sauce, It's Gravy.” I smiled, turned to my wife and said, “Solo in America è vero.” (Only in America is this true.) I don't think the couple understood me and they just went smilingly on their way, but it's a fact: only Italian-Americans – and a specific geographically limited group of Italian-Americans at that – ever refer to either marinara or tomato sauce as “gravy.” I don't care what your nonna called it, it is most decidedly not gravy.

By strict definition, a “gravy” – a word that has its origins not in Latin or Italian, but in Middle English – is a preparation made from meat drippings or juices. There's not even an equivalent Italian word for it. In Italy, a condiment that is poured over or mixed in to enhance the flavor of a dish is broadly referred to as a “salsa,” which directly translates to “sauce.” A preparation made by combining tomatoes and meat is sometimes called a “sugo” or a “ragu”. In central and southern Italy, a sugo describes a basic tomato-forward preparation while “ragu” is used in northern areas to describe a slow-cooked meat-based sauce. Northern or southern, nobody calls it “gravy” because the word doesn't exist.

So why do regional pockets of Italian-Americans call it gravy? Here's the most popular theory.

When millions upon millions of Italians began arriving on American shores around the turn of the twentieth century, many, if not most, were met with the traditional American greeting: prejudice. Hostility and bigotry were rampant. Descendants of enslaved Africans had already had their turn as objects of hatred as had the Irish and the Chinese. Americans needed somebody new to dislike and, since the Puerto Ricans and other Hispanics had not yet arrived, Italians bore the brunt. Especially those from southern regions whose darker complexions made them easier targets.

These folks quickly found that it was in their best interest to distance themselves from their “Old Country” roots. So, to “fit in” in their new surroundings, they started changing their names, often just dropping the final vowel or making the “e” “silent.” They learned at least some English and forbade the speaking of Italian dialects in their new American homes. And those rich sauces they used in their foods? Far too foreign for “real” Americans, who called the stuff they poured over their meat and potatoes “gravy.” And since we want to be real Americans, it's arrivederci sugo, e ragu, e salsa! Let's call those tomato and meat sauces we love so much “gravy” so our American neighbors will accept us.

And so “Sunday gravy” it became and “Sunday gravy” it remains. Even though it really isn't. Gravy, that is. However, along with the regional massacre of Italian words like “gabbagool” for capocollo, “mootzarell” or “mootzadell” for mozzarella, “rigot” for ricotta, and “prozhoot” for prosciutto, this is a fight on which I have long since given up. Knowledge and reason are ineffective weapons against, “That's the way my nonna said it and that's the way I'm gonna say it, so fugeddaboutit.” Pour on that “gravy,” baby, firm in the knowledge that absolutely nobody in the land that gave birth to your revered ancestors would have the slightest idea what the hell you were talking about.

Okay, so there you have the essential lowdown on Italian sauces, both the light and simple marinara and the more hearty, complex tomato sauce. Now, drive on by my house and roll down your windows.

Is It Marinara Or Is It Tomato Sauce?

It's More Than “Toe-MAY- toe” or “Toe-MAH-toe”

Tomato season is in full swing and I've got buckets of the delicious little ovoids waiting around to be turned into sauce. But what kind of sauce am I going to make? Will it be marinara or tomato sauce? And what's the difference, anyway?

It's really pretty simple: With a bright, fresh taste, marinara is quicker and easier to make, while tomato sauce possesses a deeper, richer flavor and there is a good deal more involved in its preparation.

Let's start with the variety of tomato that makes the best sauce. You can make tomato sauces out of just about any kind of tomato, but the best “saucing” tomatoes are Romas. A variety of plum tomato, Romas have thicker fruit walls, fewer seeds, and a denser, drier, firmer texture. You can slice them up and eat them raw in a salad or on a sandwich, but they are at their very best when cooked down into a sauce.

The fad in recent years has been to call any Roma tomato a “San Marzano” tomato. You see them labeled that way in cans at the store and I even bought some “San Marzano” seedling plants at the local nursery once. And it's mostly just marketing junk. There is only one true San Marzano tomato and it is grown in the rich volcanic soil near Naples in the Campania region of Italy. Anything else is a San Marzano-style or San Marzano type. The kind you can grow in your backyard that bear the “San Marzano” name are just offshoots of the common Roma tomato that have a thinner skin and a pointier shape than the real thing. And the ones in the can used to be called “Italian-style tomatoes” until San Marzano became the marketing buzzword of choice. Oh, you can buy authentic San Marzanos in cans. Look for the “D.O.P.” seal that certifies the product has been produced in its protected designated area of origin. Anything else is a San Marzano style or type. They grow them in California and I can grow them in my garden. Are they going to taste the same as the real ones? Nope.

So, if I wanted to transform my bumper crop of Romas into tomato sauce, there a a couple of ways I could go. I could embrace my French-ness and do a sauce tomate, one of Escoffier's “mother sauces.” This one is a beast that starts with a roux and incorporates vegetables, herbs, beef or veal stock, and pork fat along with the tomatoes. And it's going to take two or three hours to make. And the result is thick, rich, and flavorful. And it's okay on spaghetti but it's lousy on pizza. Too overpoweringly “tomato-y.”

Same for tomato sauce. Traditional tomato sauce is almost like a stew in that it uses a ton of ingredients and it takes a long time to cook. And it's labor-intensive. Why do you think Italian nonne work on it for entire Sunday afternoons? You start out with a soffrito of carrots, celery, and onions – all of which you have to mince up first. You cook that up in some olive oil and then you start adding in the garlic and the oregano and the basil and the salt and pepper, and, of course, the tomatoes, which you leave whole and then crush them up by hand as you add them to the sauce. Simmer it for three hours or more until you can almost stand a spoon up in it and you've got a sauce that is thick, deeply sweet, and very rich. You can throw some pepperoncino in there to make it into an arrabiata sauce or you can add in some vodka for a – you guessed it – vodka sauce. There are lots of things you can do with a good basic tomato sauce – if you have the time and energy to make it.

My Roma bounty is going to become marinara. Four ingredients, twenty minutes or so, and it's ready to lend its bright, fresh flavor to everything from pasta dishes to pizza to a dipping sauce for mozzarella sticks. It's a flavor profile that enhances a dish with a light hint of tomato rather than overwhelming it with heavy richness.

Lots of colorful theories abound regarding the origin of marinara. All of them have something to do with the sea – mare, in Italian. Some say it was cooks aboard Neapolitan ships who came up with the sauce. Others offer that it was the wives of returning Neapolitan sailors who originally cooked it up. In any case, it's been around since shortly after Spanish explorers introduced American tomatoes to European palates in the sixteenth century. In fact, Italians were among the first to grow and consume the strange new fruit that many Europeans considered poisonous until well into the nineteenth century.

And, while we're at it, STOP MISPRONOUNCING IT!! It makes my ears bleed every time I go into a so-called “Italian” restaurant and hear people ordering “mare-uh-NARE-uh.”AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHH! That horrible flat “a” sound is like nails on a blackboard to me. And to any Italian speaker. Italian is a lyrical language of fluid beauty. “Mare-uh-NARE-uh” is about as fluid as a clogged toilet. The thing is, Italians are impeccably polite when it comes to people massacring their native language. Most of them won't correct you for even the most egregious mispronunciations. Fortunately, my Italian heritage is tempered by a good dose of French, and those folks will rip you a new one in a heartbeat for linguistic crimes and misdemeanors. So listen up, morphological miscreants, the word is pronounced “mah-ree-NAH-rah.” And if you can roll the “r”s a little, so much the better. English is in the global minority when it comes to having long vowel sounds. The rest of the world – Italy included – does quite well without them, thank you, relying instead on the broad "a," pronounced like the "a" in "father" or "water." So it's “mah-ree-NAH-rah” not “mare-uh-NARE-uh.” Please!

Okay. Off the soapbox and back to the recipe book.

All you've got to do for a great marinara is to heat up a little olive oil and cook some minced garlic in it for about a minute – burned garlic is a very bad thing – before adding in crushed tomatoes and some fresh basil. Stir it up and season to taste with salt and maybe a tiny bit of crushed red pepper flake, then simmer it for fifteen or twenty minutes, stirring occasionally, and ecco! You've got a bright, sweet, fresh, delicious sauce all ready for your pizza or pasta dish. It's going to be a little thinner than traditional tomato sauce, but it's supposed to be. Who needs Ragu or Prego or whatever else comes in a jar, right?

Two ingredients to mention: sugar and butter. Some people have had their tastebuds ruined by excessive amounts of sugar. If you crave that sugary-sweet taste you get in some store-bought products, then add a pinch of sugar to your sauce, especially if you're making marinara. Tomato sauce has carrots in the base soffrito and they add a lot of natural sweetness. But tomatoes are already pretty sweet, so don't overdo it. And adding a small knob or pat of butter can smooth out the flavor and texture of a sauce and give it a nice glossy finish. Nice but not necessary.

Oh, and did I mention that uniquely Italian-American creation called “gravy?” You're right. I didn't. Because “gravy” doesn't exist in Italian culture. It's wholly a creation of Italian immigrants who wanted to better “fit in” to their new American homes. They saw that Americans poured meat-based gravy over their food, so these newly-minted Italian-Americans called their hearty tomato and tomato-based sauces “gravy” so they'd look and sound more American. Simple as that. Don't believe me? Go to Italy and ask for gravy on your pasta. They'll seat you in the crazy corner with the folks who ask for spaghetti and meatballs and fettuccine Alfredo.

Okay, as mentioned, I've got a gardenful of nice, fresh Roma tomatoes. And I'll be making sauce for the rest of the summer. But what will I do in, say, January? Same thing the other pros do; I'll go buy some canned tomatoes. Only a rabid purist or a complete idiot will tell you that canned tomatoes are inferior to fresh ones for making sauce. As a cook and occasional restaurateur, I can promise you that the tomatoes in the sauce you're eating at your favorite red-sauce place came out of a Number 10 can from a rack of Number 10 cans in the pantry and not from some farmers market or fairy tale garden out in back of the restaurant. Nope. Nothing whatsoever wrong with using canned tomatoes for marinara or tomato sauce. Just watch the quality. If you can score authentic D.O.P. San Marzanos, go for it. Otherwise, good tomatoes from brands like Cento are just fine. As with everything, you get what you pay for.

Now, go out there and grab some tomatoes – canned or fresh – and get saucy! 

Easy Recipe: Make Some Delicious Tomato Soup Tonight

Open Up A Different Can

It's officially “soup weather.” Now don't go by me; I like soup in July. But for most folks, when leaves start to turn, thoughts start to turn to warm, comforting soups. And nothing says “comfort” like a nice steaming bowl of tomato soup. Maybe float a few oyster crackers or some seasoned croutons in there and serve it up with a grilled cheese sandwich. How can a cool weather lunch or dinner get any better? Well, it can be a little better if you make the soup yourself.

When I was a kid, tomato soup meant the famous red and white can from Campbell's. That's what Mom made at home and even the diners and small-town restaurants of my youth proudly displayed those iconic containers. Ever since a Campbell's chemist named John T. Dorrance developed a commercially viable method for condensing soup around 1897, the time-honored method for making tomato soup has been to open a can, dump the concentrated contents into a pot, add water, stir, heat, and serve.

A hundred years or so later, “ready to eat” soups like Progresso began to make inroads into Campbell's territory by marketing themselves as being more “adult” in nature. And I'll admit that as I got older, I tended to “doctor” Campbell's soup with basil and perhaps a touch of cream. Or I'd just buy a can of Progresso's tomato and basil soup. But now I don't do either anymore. Not since I reconnected with a recipe I used to use in one of my restaurant kitchens several years ago. The results are delicious and the preparation is almost as easy as opening a can. In fact, you do open a can. It's just a different can, that's all.

I was watching an episode of one of those cooking competition shows not long ago and one of the contestant chefs – a self-taught Italian guy – made tomato soup from canned tomatoes. And all the other “cheffy chefs” got all up in arms, scoffing and turning up their oh-so-sophisticated culinary school noses at the very idea of using canned product. Well, lah-ti-dah. I'm here to tell them – and you – that there ain't the first thing wrong with using canned tomatoes for soups and sauces. Generations of Italian cooks, from little mamme and nonne at home up to the big name “celebrity” chefs on TV, all know that, even though there's a lot to be said for garden-fresh tomatoes, for the other forty-eight weeks of the year, good quality canned tomatoes are perfectly acceptable. So all those highfalutin culinary schoolers can just stick their fresh tomatoes where the sun don't shine – an image that will take me a long time to erase from my mind – and get over themselves.

And with all that said, here's how you make great tomato soup at home.

What you'll need:

1 tbsp olive oil

1 small to medium yellow onion, minced

2 or 3 cloves garlic, minced

1 tsp salt

½ tsp freshly ground black pepper

¼ cup tomato paste

1 can (28 oz) peeled whole tomatoes, San Marzano preferred

3 cups low-sodium chicken broth

2 or 3 tsp dried basil

And what you'll do:

In a Dutch oven or a large pot, working over medium heat, heat the olive oil. Add in the minced onion, with a pinch of salt to sweat, and saute until translucent, about five minutes. Add in the minced garlic and cook an additional minute or two. Add salt and pepper and tomato paste. Cook, stirring occasionally, another two or three minutes. Add the tomatoes, the chicken broth, and the basil; stir to combine.

Using an immersion blender, blend the soup to the desired consistency. Simmer, uncovered, for about twenty minutes. Serve.

Serves 6

A few notes on the recipe.

Some recipes you'll find use butter instead of olive oil. Go for it. Either one works. I just prefer the extra layer of flavor the olive oil imparts. 

Some recipes tell you to throw in your onions and garlic at the same time. Don't. Again, build layers of flavor. It's the Italian way. Besides, garlic burns very easily and will turn brown and bitter long before the onions are translucent. 

Watch your salt; you don't want salty soup, especially since you've already used a little salt to help sweat the onions. 

And if you prefer white pepper to black, that's okay by me. 

I like tomato paste in a tube, but you can use one of the little cans if you want. You'll just wind up with half a can of paste that you'll have to figure out how to store or use up. 

I like whole tomatoes in this recipe, but diced or crushed will work as well. After all, you're going to puree them in the end anyway. But please, please, please use San Marzano tomatoes if at all possible. Yeah, they're a little more expensive, but they're well worth it. 

Low-sodium chicken broth, please. Remember what I said about salty soup. 

And if you've got fresh basil that you want to use in place of dried, that's okay, but remember to add it later in the cooking process.

If you don't own an immersion blender – go get one! No, seriously, you can just dump the soup into a regular blender or a food processor to puree it. Then you can dump it back into the pot to finish it. See, wouldn't a stick blender be easier?

This soup only takes twenty minutes or so to cook. If you want to simmer it a little longer, you can do so. It will reduce and concentrate the flavor a little more. Speaking of flavor, if you have a Parmesan rind saved in the freezer (you do, don't you?) this would be a good place to use it for an extra flavor element. And you might want to keep a pinch of sugar handy in case the tomatoes are a little too acid. A knob of unsalted butter would also tame the acid and add a nice smooth, silky finish. Totally optional. You can also make the soup creamy by adding – guess what? – a dab of cream. But do it very last thing or you risk curdling the cream.

If you find yourself with leftover soup, put it in a clean glass jar or container of your choice – remembering that plastic stains – and keep in the fridge for about a week. Or ladle it into a freezer-safe vessel – freezer bags work well – and freeze it for a couple of months.

Try it tonight. You might still keep a can of condensed or ready-to-eat in the pantry as a backup, but I can pretty much guarantee this will become your go to tomato soup of choice.

How To Make Jarred Tomato Sauce Taste (Almost) Like Homemade

If You Can't Make It, Fake It

I've got bunch of recipes for salsa di pomodoro (tomato sauce) upon which I have come to rely over the years. They range from a quick “Five Minute” sauce I …..ahem....acquired from Canadian celebrity chef David Rocco to a good old traditional long-cooking sauce that requires hours to prepare. I've even got a raw sauce, or salsa cruda, I use on pizza. But every so often, in a move I'm sure sends shudders all the way back to my Italian second-great-grandmother, I have been known to grab a jar of Ragu out of the pantry. Calm down, nonna! I only said I grabbed a jar of sauce, not that I actually served it straight out of the jar.

Obviously, homemade is always your best bet. But I realize there are a lot of people out there who, for a lot of reasons, turn to the grocery store shelf for their pasta sauce. And that can be okay as long as you don't just dump, stir, and serve. In the spirit of “if you can't make it, fake it,” let me offer a few tips on how to make store-bought sauce taste sorta kinda almost like homemade.

First and foremost, buy decent sauce. I like Ragu but Prego is okay, too. They are a good middle-of-the-road balance between the “high end” sauces with the ridiculous price tags and the bottom of the barrel stuff you buy for ninety-nine cents a can. I generally avoid jars of super-cheap supermarket brands and I won't even touch anything in a can (lookin' at you, Hunt's.) The reason for this is that most of these products are made from low quality ingredients and contain lots of preservatives, salt, and sugar to make them taste like anything edible. You can usually hit a “2 for $5” sale or something on Ragu and make out pretty good in the cost department, so just stay away from the really cheap stuff.

Next, I buy the plain “traditional” version of Ragu/Prego. Whatever you do, don't buy anything “flavored” with “meat.” Same thing goes for mushrooms or vegetables or any other ingredient added for your convenience. Just buy the plain stuff and add your own extras, okay?

Now after you open the jar and pour the sauce in the pan, get ready to do some serious “doctoring.” In the great French tradition of mise en place – which the Italians probably invented – have all your ingredients stove-side and ready to go. They will include olive oil, red pepper flakes, garlic, tomato paste, dried oregano, and fresh basil. Also have some sugar, some salt, some lemon juice, and some butter handy as well as a little bit of the water in which you are cooking the pasta.

“Wait a minute, wait a minute” you say. “That's almost as much work as making the stuff from scratch.” Well......yeah.......sorta. But believe me, it's worth it in the end.

So, turn the heat on under your pan to low or medium low. You want to simmer the sauce, not boil it. Add in just a glug or two of olive oil. You're looking for a layer of flavor here, not a greasy sauce. In fact, this whole exercise is about building flavors, which is what Italian cooking is all about in the first place. When you make sauce from scratch, you build layers of flavor. This is kind of a shortcut. I know, nonna! Please stop crying!

Add some red pepper flakes, to taste. In Italian, that's quanto basta, abbreviated qb, and loosely translated as “just enough.” Remember, some people have a higher tolerance for heat and spice than others. Taste as you season so your sauce doesn't go arrabbiata on you and burn out somebody's taste buds. Qb is the key. Quanto basta.

All right. Now it's time for some tomato paste. In spite of what the name implies, tomato paste is not an adhesive used to glue tomatoes together. Tomato paste is concentrated tomatoes that have been skinned, seeded, strained and then cooked down until they become.....well, paste-like. Its principle purpose is to punch up the tomato flavor in sauces, soups, stews and the like. And that's what we're using it for here; to amp up the generally bland taste of jarred tomato sauce. Again, quality counts. Stay away from the cheap stuff and look for product made by Cento – my favorite – or Amore, another decent Italian brand. Both of these come in tubes, kind of like toothpaste. The great thing about tubes as opposed to cans is that you can use as little or as much as you need, screw the top back on the tube, and stick it in the fridge for later use. Can't do that with a can. And since all you'll generally need is a tablespoon or two, the advantage should be obvious. So, squeeze out that tablespoon or two and stir it into your simmering sauce.

Garlic is optional and depends on your choice of flavor profile. Sometimes I use it and sometimes I don't. When I do, I opt for fresh garlic over some form of dehydrated powder or granules. Watch “Clemenza” make sauce in “The Godfather” or watch “Paulie” slice garlic with a razor blade in “Goodfellas.” Then do what I do: grab a microplane grater and grate up a clove or two. It's a lot easier. Jarred sauces usually have some onion and garlic in them and if what's in there is okay for your taste, leave it at that. Otherwise, use some fresh garlic as an additional layer of flavor.

Again, there's usually some Italian seasonings in jarred sauces: just usually not enough. So stir in a bit of oregano. Just a pinch; a little goes a long way especially if you're using dried oregano, which can be pretty potent. When it comes to basil, I prefer fresh and I add it toward the end of the cooking process so that it retains its fullest flavor. Taste, taste, taste. Don't just toss stuff in the pot. Taste as you go.

Which brings me to the next point. I mentioned sugar, salt, lemon juice, and butter. You may need them and you may not depending on your taste. Sometimes the manufacturer will add sugar to counter the natural acidity of tomatoes. You don't want to add more or you'll make the sauce too sweet. Taste it first and if it's too acidic, add a pinch of sugar. Conversely, if it's already too sweet, add a little lemon juice. And salt can help balance both flavors. Once again, it's all about tasting as you go.

What about the butter? In chef-speak, it's called “finishing” the sauce. Or maybe you've watched one of those fancy cooking shows and heard the chef talked about “mounting” the sauce. Get the obvious image out of your mind. The French term for finishing a sauce with butter is “monte au beurre,” and it involves adding few pats of cold butter to the warm sauce in order to make it richer and shinier and just a little bit more flavorful. You don't have to do it, but you'll impress your family and friends with your knowledge of classic technique if you do.

Another little add in I'm fond of is one of those Italian “secrets:” Parmesan cheese rind. Now if the only way you ever buy your Parmesan cheese is pre-shredded in a package or (shudder) in that execrable green plastic or cardboard “can,” you've probably never even seen the rind from a hunk of real, authentic Parmigiano-Reggiano. And that's a pity that borders on a culinary criminal offense. But that's a rant for another day, so if you do actually use the real stuff, or even a reasonable domestic facsimile thereof, save the rind – you can collect a bunch of them in the freezer – and add it to jarred tomato sauce for yet another layer of real Italian flavor. Just let it sit and simmer in the sauce. But remember to remove what's left of the rind before you serve your sauce. I forgot once: explaining the misshapen, cheesy, sauce-covered lump to the person who got it on their plate was rather embarrassing.

Finally, I mentioned cooking water. This is the ultimate Italian “secret ingredient;” an ingredient known to generations of nonne. And it's just stupid simple. Before you throw away the salty, starchy water in which your pasta has been boiling for the last eight to ten minutes, dip a cup or ladle into the pot and reserve a little bit of it on the side. Not much. A half-cup or so is fine. Then, as you reach the final stages of preparing your sauce to receive the pasta, spoon in just a little of the reserved water. It's a trick that will almost magically finish developing the flavor and texture of your sauce.

There you have it. Is it more work than “dump and stir?” Yep. But it's also less work than scratch-made and when done right can be almost as good. Ouch! Nonna, stop that! I said “almost.” I know, nothing is as good as the sauce you spend hours lovingly preparing, but give people a break, okay? At least they're trying. Really, nonna, put down the wooden spoon! Please?

Ciao for now and buon appetito!

In Search of Real Italian Tomatoes

(This post is one of a series on real Italian ingredients. For more information on identifying authentic Italian food products, visit http://www.trueitalianfood.it/.)

Let's look at another staple of Italian cuisine, tomatoes. Many people think that Caesar ate tomato sauce. Not true. Tomatoes were not introduced into Italian food culture until the late 17^th or early 18^th century. When the great explorers first brought them back from the New World, Europeans believed tomatoes to be poisonous. As ornamentals they were okay to look at, but because they are botanically members of the nightshade family, nobody was brave enough to actually eat them! Happily, things changed.

Now, tomatoes are tomatoes, right? They're round and red and grow on vines and you make spaghetti sauce out of them, right? Wrong. If you want an authentic Italian taste from an authentic Italian product, look for tomatoes that are specifically labeled as “San Marzano” tomatoes.

San Marzano tomatoes are a delicate, thin skinned variety of plum tomato grown in an area near the Italian village of San Marzano sul Sarno, which is located southeast of Naples in the fertile valley of Mt. Vesuvius. The DOP* certification area for San Marzano tomatoes actually involves 39,540 acres in three of the provinces of Campania, including a rough triangle formed by Salerno, Naples and a small part of Avellino.

There are numerous myths and legends regarding the origins of the San Marzano tomato, such as the historically ridiculous premise that the seeds were a gift to the King of Naples from the King of Peru back in 1770. Although it's true that tomatoes probably did originate in or around Peru, the little fly in the ointment here is that Peru was firmly and somewhat brutally under Spanish control in 1770. There was nothing even remotely resembling a “king” of Peru by that time. But the story is told.

San Marzanos are thought to be a hybrid of three different varieties including the King Umberto. (The other two, the Fiaschella, and the Fiascona, have faded into agricultural insignificance.) They started catching on around the turn of the 20^th century. Ferruccio Zago, a professor at the University of Naples, writing in Nozioni di Orticultura (Concepts Of Horticulture) in 1920, noted, “The peeled tomato industry is a source of pride for Campania. People use a variety known as san marzano.... The plant can bear up to 10–12 bunches of fruit.... The skin has a bright red color and is easily removable, an indispensable characteristic for preparing peeled tomatoes. The pulp is dense and only slightly sugary in flavor....”

It is said that San Marzano tomatoes owe their unique flavor to the rich volcanic soil in which they are grown. They have a deep red color and an unmatchable sweet taste. They are sought after and preferred by cooks and chefs around the world as the absolute best tomato for use in a tomato sauce.

No, you won't find them fresh in your neighborhood supermarket. Tender little fruits that they are, (and yes, tomatoes are fruits, not vegetables) it's hard enough for grocers to import fresh tomatoes from Florida or California, let alone Italy. So off to the canned food section we go.

There are dozens of brands of San Marzano tomatoes available to American consumers. The tomatoes packed by Cento are the ones I usually use, mostly because they are the most widely marketed in my area, but I've purchased other good brands as well, depending on availability. Brand is not really a consideration. It's the variety that counts.

Bear in mind that San Marzanos are only one of several varieties of plum tomato. Don't be fooled by labels that say “Italian” or “Italian-style” tomatoes. Most authentic San Marzano tomatoes will be identified as such and will bear the DOP seal on the label. Most will also carry authentication from the Consorzio di Tutela del Pomodoro San Marzano - Agro Nocerino Sarnese, a consortium dedicated to the protection of San Marzano tomatoes. There are a few growers who object to paying for the DOP and Conzorio stamps and choose to market their produce without the certifications. I've never encountered any, although at least one such company ships its unstamped San Marzano tomatoes directly to the North American market. I can't say whether or not the seal makes a difference. But the variety definitely does.

San Marzano tomatoes have the distinction of being the only tomato permitted for use on Vera Pizza Napoletana (True Neapolitan Pizza) as defined by the Associazione Vera Pizza Napoletana. If you want real authentic Italian tomatoes, these are your babies. If you don't care, buy Hunts or Del Monte.

While we're right there in the neighborhood, let's take a look at the tomato paste.

When I was a kid, my uncle told me that tomato paste was the stuff they used to hold tomatoes together. Fortunately, I was a smart kid. Tomato paste is actually just that – a thick paste produced by cooking and reducing tomatoes down to a thick, rich concentrate.

You'll see lots of little cans of tomato paste on store shelves. Some sound really Italian. One such can is labeled “tomato paste product” made from “Roma style tomatoes” and containing “Italian herbs.” Oh, and catch the ingredient list: “Tomato puree (tomato paste, water), high fructose corn syrup, salt, dried onions, partially hydrogenated vegetable oil (soybean and/or cottonseed), spices, hydrolyzed corn gluten, soy & wheat gluten proteins, grated Romano cheese made from cow's milk (cultured milk, salt, enzymes), garlic, citric acid, yeast, soy flour.” Wow! You think this is going in my tomato sauce?

Actually, I prefer my tomato paste in a tube rather than a can. Easier to use, easier to store. My choice is Amore Italian Tomato Paste. Now, Amore is not DOP or IGP or anything of the sort. But the company's literature says the tubes contain “fresh Italian ingredients,” and the ingredients listed are tomato paste and salt. So is it certifiably authentic Italian? No. Is it kind of Italian? Yeah, probably. Is it better than the chemistry set in a can? Definitely!

Actually, Amore, like many, many other manufacturers, labels its goods as a “product of Italy.” What does this mean? It kind of means “caveat emptor” because it only indicates that either some component of the overall product comes from Italy or that the processing and/or assembly are done in Italy or even that the company's facilities are located in Italy. Take olive oil. You can have olives that are grown in Greece, bottles that are made in Germany, bottlecaps produced in Spain, and labels printed in France. As long as they are all assembled in a factory in Italy, the finished product can legitimately bear the phrase “product of Italy” on the label. Not saying that's the case with Amore – because they do make some pretty good stuff – but keep that idea in mind when you buy. A “product of Italy” is always my second choice. DOP or IGP stamped products always rank first.

*[DOP (Denominazione di Origine Protetta) and IGP (Indicazione Geografica Protetta) are the Italian translations of the EU's Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) and Protected Geographical Indication (PGI).]