I always have a couple of cans of Muir Glen organic diced tomatoes on hand to throw into soups, bean dishes, stews, and this great tomato sauce.
You could make the sauce with fresh tomatoes, but using canned ones makes this a quick meal from the pantry. And it tastes better than any spaghetti sauce out of a jar.
This is not the traditional tomato sauce cooked for hours over a hot stove. It takes under 15 minutes to make, and has a fresh zestiness that perks up any meal.
Don't limit it to pasta. Stir it into cooked cannellini beans or brown rice or barley for a great main dish. Pour it over cooked spaghetti squash or baked potatoes. It is a natural with any kind of cooked greens like chard or mustard greens. On toasted baguette. Poured over polenta. Your imagination is the limit.
When I made this last week I used a roasted red pepper in place of the orange bell pepper. You could use any kind of pepper, or you could use a diced carrot instead for the color and sweetness. I also added a hungarian hot pepper from our garden that gave the sauce a little kick.
If you don't have shallots, use four spring onions or a quarter cup of diced sweet Maui or Walla Walla onions. You could even use regular onion - whatever you have. The white wine adds a depth of flavor (I used a pinot gris) but you can leave it out if you prefer. If you have fresh basil, chop a handful to add near the end of cooking.
This recipe makes a little under 2 cups of sauce, enough for 1/2 lb of pasta.
Tomato Sauce
1 tbsp olive oil
2 shallots, minced
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1/2 cup white wine
1 orange bell pepper, diced small
14 oz can diced tomatoes
salt and pepper to taste
Heat oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add shallots and cook one minute. Add garlic and cook another minute. Add wine and bell pepper and cook until wine evaporates, about 3 minutes. Add the tomatoes with their juice. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the liquid is reduced in half, about 10 minutes.
I know, it's too simple. But give it a try, using good ingredients. You'll be surprised.
What about the warning we now get to avoid canned tomatoes?
ReplyDeleteDan
That's a good question. Any time we use packaged foods we risk absorbing chemicals from the packaging. (Remember the fuss about dioxin in milk cartons?) However, sometimes we need timesavers. Our bodies can break down and eliminate small amounts of most chemicals. The trouble is when they are overwhelmed with huge amounts of toxins. So limit exposure as much as you can.
ReplyDeleteBisphenol-A, which is currently used to line cans, has been banned in soft plastic products that children might chew. However it's okay in cans of food. Weird, eh? The good news is Muir Glen organic tomatoes will be using new cans with the next tomato harvest so we won't have to worry about it any more. Until we find out the next cans are bad too. Was it better to use cans without linings, like when we were kids? I don't know.
I do know that the key to living in this toxin-filled society is to avoid chemicals whenever possible, but not to limit our options so much that we get overwhelmed and give up and eat at McDonalds.
(In other words, a couple of cans of tomatoes a month won't kill you. And when you're eating them, think of the antioxidants like lycopene that are supporting your body, rather than the chemicals that are not. And if they're organic canned tomatoes, they start off with fewer chemicals than non-organic.)