Homemade, Easy, and Fast
Ready to serve
In a hurry, but want a really special homemade sauce for your spaghetti or pasta?
If you have fresh tomatoes on hand, here’s a recipe that doesn’t take much preparation time or time in cooking. The flavor is so good that it can stand on it’s own ——-or you can add olive oil, garlic, vinegar, parsley, basil or whatever you like and/or have on hand. If you plan to freeze the sauce, I would suggest freezing only the sauce without any added ingredients.
Here it is mid-December and I still have fresh tomatoes from the garden. (You can do this too. Read my post telling you how.) I had an overabundance of tomatoes that were ripening , so I quickly made a sauce for tonight’s dinner.
I used about about 15 ripe medium sized tomatoes. (15 tomatoes will make 2 to 4 servings of sauce depending on how much you like on your pasta.)
About 15 tomatoes, peeled, cored and sliced in baking dish.
Peel and core. Slice. (Added note July 2014 You can peel or not. The skins come to the top and are easily removed if you want The first time I made this I peeled but ow opt for the time-saving no-peel way.)
Place in baking dish. Bake 450 degrees.
Baking time depends on how many layers you have in the dish. One layer takes about 35 minutes. I had several layers and it took about one hour. They’re ready when there is hardly any liquid left in the dish.
Roasted tomatoes – done when hardly any liquid remains.
Remove from oven. Cool 5 or 10 minutes. Stir.
If you want to add spices – now is the time. (I don’t add any if I’m going to freeze the sauce. See my comment in the comments section below.) If I’m going to use the sauce for dinner and I want to, I might add a splash or two of olive oil, vinegar, sauteed minced garlic (or use dried minced garlic) and chopped fresh parsley.
A few optional ingredients.
Stir. Serve over pasta.
Memo: If you want you can put the finished roasted tomatoes in the blender to get an even creamier sauce. I do this when I freeze mine in zip lock bags for winter use. As long as you’ve roasted the tomatoes long enough, the consistency is as good as what you get when you make spaghetti sauce from bought tomato paste. (The taste is far superior.)
Whole Wheat spaghetti, homemade sauce, fresh chopped parsley, fresh parmesan
Freeze or refrigerate what remains for another time.
Roasted tomatoes have a great flavor and the sauce seems to better coat the pasta than homemade sauce cooked on top the stove. If you haven’t tried it I think you’ll be amazed. You’re in for a treat.
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Just a thought: If you don’t have fresh tomatoes and you’re anxious to try this recipe before next tomato season, try it with your canned tomatoes. I don’t know that the flavor would be quite the same but it’s certainly worth a try. (I’d save the juice for another time and drain the tomatoes before placing them in the baking dish.)
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Two important points are reviewed in my post Addendum to A Quick and Delicious Tomato Sauce as a result of emails I received from this post. They will help insure your sauce is the best it can be! Please be sure and read it.
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For additional bits of information to make your sauce the best it can be please read all the posts on Tomato Sauce:
Tomatoes – Roasted – For the Easiest Most Delicious Tomato Sauce
Addendum to A Quick and Delicious Tomato Sauce
How to Make Tomato Sauce or Tomato Paste the Easy Way
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That sounds delicious and I will try it with my frozen tomatoes (from the freezer). Not sure I’ll ever have fresh tomatoes this late here in Madison. We have had really cold weather-in the teens every night for a couple weeks. A little unusual. My lettuce and spinach and collards are fine though.
I’ll be anxious to learn how the sauce turns out with your frozen tomatoes, Beppy. Please let me know via commenting on this post because I think others might want to know as well.
Our weather is in the twenties and of course my tomatoes are not in the garden. I finished picking them before the freeze in early November. It’s easy to have tomatoes through December. Just read my post How to Keep Tomatoes Through December for Eating Fresh.
As a matter of fact, we had some of Bill’s patrons pick up a painting last evening and they had dinner with us as well. As part of the appetizer I served cherry tomatoes. (They just couldn’t get enough!) And for the salad I had the most beautiful slices of red ripe tomatoes that you have every seen! All were green when I picked them the first part of November.
Give it a try next year. Then you’ll have fresh red tomatoes to go with your beautiful lettuce!
Best,
Theresa
This is the best tomato sauce ever! Our stored tomatoes were used and when they’re gone I’ll try it using canned ones.
Hi Ann,
So glad you commented. This recipe is so simple it’s hard to believe it would be so delicious! When you use the canned ones, let me know how the sauce turns out.
Best,
Theresa
I used my frozen tomatoes and it was absolutely delicious. I let them thaw part way and then sliced them. There was an awful lot of juice so it took longer but it was worth the wait.
Thank you, thank you.
Beppy
This is exciting, Beppy. How wonderful knowing that this “easy as pie” sauce can be made from frozen tomatoes as well. If Ann makes it with her canned tomatoes and it turns out as good we’ll have a 3 time winner here!
Thanks for letting me know.
Theresa
Fantastic recipe! I plan to use a good portion of this years tomato surplus to make and freeze into this sauce for some yummy winter meals. For anyone on the fence – do not hesitate. It is out of this world! Thanks Theresa!
Thanks for the ‘thumbs up’, Farming Bear!
Theresa
OK, I have enough tomatoes to start making this delicious sauce today! Do you think blanching them for a minute to slip the skins off more easily before roasting them will change the flavor?
Betty, that’s a good question, but a tough one. Probably it won’t matter, but just to be on the safe side why not try it without blanching —- at least until you’ve fixed this sauce a few times. Then if you try it with them blanched you’ll know for sure. Remembering back, when I was first “perfecting” my version of roasted tomatoes and sauce I blanched, peeled, and then roasted. That didn’t last when I found that I could save lots of time by not doing it.
Also, when the sauce is done and as it cools, you’ll see the skins and they’re easy to pick out then if you don’t want them in the sauce. The few that remain won’t make much difference (at least they don’t to me).
Let me know how it works out for you Betty. Glad you’re gonna make this! You’ll love it!
Theresa
Here’s a story that I found interesting and might be of interest to you if you are getting ready to prepare this sauce:
I had a good friend and reader visit me recently. I fixed a favorite appetizer before dinner. The original recipe uses fresh tomatoes, topped with cubed mozzarella cheese, chopped fresh basil, and drizzled with olive oil. Since I didn’t have fresh tomatoes that early in June, I thawed about a 1/4 cup of my roasted tomatoes (a/k/a sauce). I cubed the cheese, tossed in the thawed roasted tomatoes, and topped with fresh chopped basil.
My friend loved the taste.
Now, here’s what makes the story so interesting. She said, “I could never thaw my roasted tomatoes (sauce) out and use like this because no one would eat it.” She said it didn’t have the good taste mine had.
I can’t determine exactly why that’s the case and what it is she did that was different. But I do know she added olive oil to her’s before freezing. I would not add olive oil at all before freezing. And most definitely I would not add it while the tomatoes are roasting! If I wanted to add olive oil for a certain recipe, I’d do it after I thawed it out and was making the recipe (or if I was going to use it for dinner rather than freeze it.)
The bottom line is – little things can make a big difference in taste.
In regard to adding oils and spices, I would suggest not adding anything until you thaw the sauce and get ready to use it. That way you get the full sweet tomato flavor. (And of course, if you’re not going to freeze it – but rather use it right away, then add your seasonings.)
Theresa
So I tried the USDA boiling water canning method for crushed tomatoes. I had 9 lbs of various tomatoes. I spent hours boiling jars, skinning and deseeding/coring and then canning those tomatoes. All I got was a hot kitchen and two pints of tomatoes! I then cored, sliced and roasted the rest of the tomatoes. It was so easy and I have nice quart bags of the best-tasting sauce in my freezer. All the acidity of the tomatoes disappears by roasting. I will never can tomatoes again!
I can’t tell you how glad I am you have this posted on your site. I somehow lost my copy. I had many people at my house to feed as they were evacuating from fires here in Oregon. My tomatoes were just starting to ripen so I roasted as many as I could and made enough pasta sauce and homemade bread to feed everyone! Thank you so much Theresa for teaching this delicious method.