Making Whole Tomato Sauce

August 18, 2017

This weekend, why not make some delicious homemade tomato sauce with tomatoes harvested from your own garden? It's so easy to do.

As you know from my last blog, I love making lots of tomato sauce. It's delicious, nutritious, and easy to add to your favorite pastas. Plus, if you have the freezer space, it can be stored in plastic containers for any time you need a tasty, quick meal. I also like to save it for entertaining - guests love this homemade sauce - and you will too.

Yesterday, before I left for another few days at Skylands, my home in Seal Harbor, Maine, I made several quarts of flavorful tomato sauce with the peeled and seeded tomatoes I prepared earlier in the week. Enjoy these photos.

: After a brief ride around the farm to see how everything was doing, I decided to make a couple batches of tomato sauce. We’ve been harvesting so many tomatoes – there will be lots of great sauce to enjoy all year long.

: The first step is to prepare the onions – for about 12-cups of sauce, you’ll need about four onions. These onions are from my garden, of course.

: I removed all the skins and cut them in half.

: And then sliced and chopped them into small pieces.

: These Cangshan knives are so sharp. They are hand forged and hand sharpened, and have Swedish sourced stain resistant high-alloy steel blades – they’re great.

: Using your favorite olive oil, pour some into the pot. This pot is from my collection exclusively at Macy’s. I love my stainless steel pots – they’re so durable.

: Add the chopped onions, and stir them occasionally as they saute, so they do not burn.

: I used two different pots, so I could keep the tomato colors separated – one pot for the orange tomatoes and one pot for the red.

: Here is my favorite spoon rest – also from my collection exclusively at Macy’s. It’s large enough to hold a variety of utensils. goo.gl/A8Ev1W

: After adding the onions, add a couple cloves of garlic, sliced, into each pot.

: Then, add the tomatoes.

: I love the bold orange color of these tomatoes – so beautiful. Next, add salt and pepper to taste.

: And in the red batch of tomatoes, my special tip – add a touch of sugar, about a teaspoon. The orange sauce won’t need it.

: Next, add a bunch of chopped basil to each pot, and let it simmer for about an hour, uncovered. And don’t forget to stir it occasionally. So easy!

: Here is the orange sauce after about 45-minutes. I love the chunky pieces of tomato – this sauce is delicious with any pasta.

: And here is the red sauce – it’s almost done.

: I set out quart-sized containers on the counter. These are great for freezing almost anything, and can be ordered in bulk, online. They’re also very useful when sharing your homemade sauce with family and friends.

: Once the sauces are done, I poured all of it into the containers using my square ladle I designed for my collection at Macy’s. It gets into corners so easily.

: Don’t overfill – you can always use another container. Here, I did have a little leftover for a smaller, pint-sized container. Let the sauce cool before covering.