Marinara is a quick, easy, herb forward bright tomato sauce that you can whip up in literally a matter of minutes. Made with pantry staples, it’s a sure fire answer to the repeatedly asked “What’s for dinner?” question! It keeps great, so you can make it a day or two in advance and keep it in your fridge, or you can make more than you need and easily freeze the leftovers. How awesome is that? You can eat it simply tossed with some pasta, add some meatballs or use it as pizza sauce! It’s a wonderfully helpful sauce to have in your back pocket!
Since the star of this show really is the tomatoes, it’s super important to get the good ones. I always look for San Marzano whole peeled tomatoes from Italy, trust me on this one, they are the best!
Typically I buy peeled whole tomatoes and then crush them by hand, simply squeezing the tomatoes. To me, this tactile sensation is a fun part of the food experience! However, if it’s not your thing (or you don’t like your sauce ending up with larger chunks of tomatoes after cooking) you can buy the crushed tomatoes and everything will still taste terrific. One hint, you’ll notice when you empty the cans there still will be a decent amount of tomato sauce clinging to the inside of the cans. Don’t let that go to waste! Use a small amount of water, swish it around the inside of the can and capture as much of that flavorful sauce as possible!
After you’ve flavored your oil with the garlic, you simply add the remaining ingredients to your saucepan, allow them to bubble and simmer and do their thing while you do yours….like make a salad tossed with Everyday Salad Dressing and cook some pasta!
Toss the sauce with the pasta of your choice (this recipe will cover at least a pound of pasta) and sprinkle with some freshly grated parmesan and/or some fresh basil! Yum!
Marinara
Ingredients
- 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
- 8 cloves garlic, smashed
- 2 28 oz cans San Marzano whole peeled tomatoes
- 1/4 cup fresh basil, rough chopped (or 2 teaspoons dried basil)
- 1/2 teaspoon oregano
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- pinch crushed red pepper
Instructions
- Heat extra virgin olive oil (EVOO) in a medium size saucepan over medium high heat. Toss in 8 whole cloves of garlic and allow to brown slightly, this should take 2-3 minutes. (You’ll want to keep watch and stir so they don’t burn.)
- At this point you can either remove the garlic, or just leave it in the sauce.
- If using whole tomatoes, dump the tomatoes and all the juice from the cans into a medium sized bowl. Using your hands, squeeze whole tomatoes breaking them up as best you can. Add tomatoes, dried basil, oregano salt and crushed red pepper to flavored olive oil. (If you are using fresh basil, set it aside and add to the sauce after it has simmered. This will help retain the bright flavors that fresh basil brings to the sauce.)
- Bring sauce to a boil, and then lower to a simmer. Continue simmering uncovered for about 30-45 minutes.