Terrific Five-Ingredient Tomato Sauce
by Erin Fletter
Photo by Nadia Yong/Shutterstock.com
prep time
5 minutes
cook time
makes
4-6 servings
Fun-Da-Mentals Kitchen Skills
- measure :
to calculate the specific amount of an ingredient required using a measuring tool (like measuring cups or spoons).
- simmer :
to cook a food gently, usually in a liquid, until softened.
Equipment Checklist
- Can opener
- Measuring spoons
- Small saucepan
scale
1X
2X
3X
4X
5X
6X
7X
Ingredients
Terrific Five-Ingredient Tomato Sauce
- 1 14-oz can tomato sauce or puréed tomatoes **(for TOMATO ALLERGY omit sauce or use olive oil + chopped basil to top gnocchi or pasta)**
- 3 T butter **(for DAIRY ALLERGY sub olive oil)**
- 1 to 2 tsp onion powder
- 1 to 2 tsp salt
- 1 T sugar
Food Allergen Substitutions
Terrific Five-Ingredient Tomato Sauce
- Tomato: Omit recipe or use olive oil + chopped basil to top gnocchi or pasta.
- Dairy: Substitute olive oil for butter.
Instructions
Terrific Five-Ingredient Tomato Sauce
1.
measure + add + simmer
Measure and add 1 can tomato sauce, 3 tablespoons butter, 1 to 2 teaspoons onion powder, 1 to 2 teaspoons salt, and 1 tablespoon of sugar to a small saucepan. Bring to a simmer and cook until butter melts. Pour sauce over "Bellissima" Basil Kid-Made Gnocchi (see recipe) or cooked pasta. It's great topped with shredded basil and parmesan cheese!
Photo by Zaitsava Olga/Shutterstock.com
Hi! I’m Tomato!
"I'm a beautiful, juicy red Tomato. Do you pronounce my name: "tuh-may-tow" or "tuh-mah-tow?" Either way you slice it (or say it), we tomatoes are wonderfully adaptable. You'll find us fresh or cooked on sandwiches, in salads, tacos, soups, stews, sauces, and much more."
History & Etymology
- The tomatoes we have now descended from the pea-size fruit of wild plants that grew in western South America. Mesoamericans were the first to domesticate the tomato plant sometime before 500 BCE.
- Hernán Cortés, a Spanish conquistador, may have brought tomatoes back to Europe in the 16th century after conquering the Aztec city, Tenochtitlan (now Mexico City).
- Tomatoes cultivated in North American colonies in the early 1700s may have been introduced from the Caribbean. Thomas Jefferson also brought tomato seeds back from France. Before tomatoes were used in cooking, the plants were used ornamentally due to some people's beliefs that they were poisonous. One reason for this error was that tomatoes come from the nightshade family, including the belladonna plant (or deadly nightshade), which has highly toxic leaves and berries. Another reason may be that the pewter plates they used back then adversely reacted to the acid in tomato juice.
- China is by far the largest producer of tomatoes in the world. In the United States, California and Florida produce the most tomatoes.
- The American and British pronunciations of "tomato" were made famous by an Ira and George Gershwin song from 1937 called "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off." Americans pronounce the word "tuh-may-tow," and the British say "tuh-mah-tow."
- The word "tomato" comes from the Spanish, French, or Portuguese "tomate," from the Nahuatl "tomatl."
Anatomy
- The tomato is a berry from the tomato plant (Solanum Lycopersicum), a perennial vine. It is part of the Solanaceae family, like the potato, pepper, eggplant, and petunia. Since it is a berry, it is a fruit, although mainly used as a vegetable.
- A tomato's color is usually red but can also be yellow, orange, green, or purple. Tomatoes can be spherical, oval, or pear-shaped. Their flesh is pulpy with cavities, called locules, that hold the seeds.
- There are more than 10,000 tomato varieties. Some are hybrids, and some are heirlooms. An heirloom tomato is a variety that has been grown for generations on a family farm rather than commercially. Unfortunately, in the past 40 years, many heirloom varieties have been lost, along with the smaller family farms that grew them. However, hundreds of heirloom tomato varieties are still available.
How to Pick, Buy, & Eat
- If you are growing your own tomatoes, pick them from the vine while still firm, with a slight give, and before their ripe color (usually red) deepens too much. While holding the fruit, twist it off the stem until it snaps off. The leaf on top of the tomato (the calyx) and part of the stem will come with it. You can also snip it off using garden scissors.
- When you choose tomatoes at the store, pick fruit that has smooth, brightly colored skin with no cracks or bruises, is firm but gives with slight pressure, is heavy for its size, and has a pleasant, aromatic smell. Avoid tomatoes with pale or dark spots.
- Store tomatoes at room temperature, as their flavor will decrease in a refrigerator's cold temperature. Wait to wash them until you are ready to use them.
- If you plan to make a tomato sauce or soup using fresh, raw tomatoes, you will want to peel them first. This can be difficult without some preparation: First, put a pot of water on the stove to boil and fill a large bowl with cold or icy water. Next, after washing the tomatoes, use your knife to cut a shallow 'X' through the skin at the top or bottom of each one. Then use a slotted spoon to place the tomatoes into the boiling water until the skin begins to loosen and peel back at the incision, about 30 to 60 seconds. Finally, immediately dunk them into the ice water. The skin should peel easily now. You can also remove the seeds by cutting the peeled tomatoes in half and scooping the seeds out with a spoon.
- Tomatoes are versatile vegetables for cooking. Ripe tomatoes can be prepared fresh, stuffed, baked, boiled, or stewed, and they are the base for many sauces. You can also pickle green, unripe tomatoes, add them to salsa or bread and fry them.
Nutrition
- Tomatoes are a moderate source of vitamin C, and cooked tomatoes are high in lycopene, an antioxidant, which may help protect your body's cells from damage, strengthen your immune system, and prevent some diseases.
History of Tomato Sauce!
Photo by amedeoemaja/Shutterstock.com
- Tomato sauce is believed to have originated in Mexico during the Aztec Empire in the 15th century, although tomatoes may have been used in Mesoamerican cooking much earlier.
- A Franciscan friar who studied the Aztecs for 50 years may have been the first person to write about tomato sauce in the 16th century. Tomato sauce was first included in an Italian cookbook in the late 1600s, and it was first paired with pasta in a 1790 Italian cookbook.
- To prepare tomato sauce, blanch fresh tomatoes to remove the skin, then core and seed them (optional). Chop the tomatoes (for a chunky sauce) or purée them (for a smooth sauce). Combine the tomatoes with other ingredients, such as basil, garlic, olive oil, onions, peppers, and salt, and then simmer everything for 30 to 90 minutes.
- Tomato sauce is part of a variety of foods, depending on what country or region they are from. It is a base for salsas, moles, and other sauces. It is a topping for meatballs, sausage, pasta, vegetables, fish, poultry, and other meats. Tomato sauce can also be added to soups and stews.
Let's Learn About Italy!
Photo by Marina Andrejchenko/Shutterstock.com
- Italy became a unified country in 1861, only 150 years ago. It is sometimes called "bel paese" or "beautiful country."
- Italians invented the piano and the thermometer!
- In ancient Roman mythology, two twin brothers named Romulus and Remus founded Rome, Italy's capital city. The myth says the twins were abandoned and then discovered by a she-wolf before being found and raised by a shepherd and his wife. Eventually (and after many exciting adventures), they found themselves at the location of Palatine Hill, where Romulus built "Roma." The Italian wolf became Italy's unofficial national animal.
- In the 1930s and 40s, Mussolini, Italy's prime minister, and dictator tried to eliminate all foreign words from the Italian language. How did he do that? He just changed them! For example, in soccer, "goal" became "meta." Disney character names changed, too: Donald Duck became "Paperino;" Mickey Mouse became "Topolino;" and Goofy became "Pippo." Although they're not banned anymore, these words and names have stuck. So now if you go to the Italian Disneyland, called Gardaland Park, you will see Topolino and Pippo!
- About 60 million people call Italy home, and it is 116,350 square miles, slightly larger than the US state of Arizona. If you compare that to the United Kingdom, 67 million people live there, and it is about 94,350 square miles. So, the UK is smaller than Italy but has a bigger population!
- The Italian flag is green, white, and red. These colors represent hope, faith, and charity.
- The average Italian eats close to 55 pounds of pasta annually. If you think about how light pasta is, that is a considerable amount! There are more than 500 different types of pasta eaten in Italy today.
What's It Like to Be a Kid in Italy?
- Kids begin school at 6 years old. They grow up speaking Italian, but they learn English in school, so many become bilingual in Italian and English.
- The most popular sport for kids is football (soccer). The Italian word for soccer is "calcio," the same word they use for "kick." A favorite of younger kids is "Rody, the bouncing horse," a plastic horse that a small child can hop onto and bounce around the room. Rody was invented in Italy in 1984.
- The family ("la famiglia") is a central characteristic of Italian life. Children have great respect for their older relatives. It is traditional to name the first male child after the grandfather and the first female child after the grandmother.
- If kids live close to school, they can go home and have lunch with their families! Lunch at school might be pasta, meat with vegetables, a sandwich, or a salad with lots of ingredients. Families typically eat dinner later (7 to 8 pm), so kids end up staying up later, too!
- Between lunch and dinner, kids often enjoy "merenda," which is an afternoon snack that translates to "something that is deserved." It is really a mini-meal that can include both savory and sweet foods. Examples of savory foods are a salami or mortadella sandwich, a slice of rustic bread rubbed with a cut, raw tomato, or "pizza bianca" (white pizza without tomato sauce). Types of sweet foods eaten during merenda are "gelato" (a lower-fat type of ice cream), any kind of cake, or biscotti dipped in warm milk.
Lettuce Joke Around
Why did the tomato blush?
Because he saw the salad dressing!
Lettuce Joke Around
How do you fix a broken tomato?
Tomato paste!
