Marinara sauce is one of the first recipes that I shared on my blog.  April 9, 2011, as I struggled to maneuver through my Wordpress dashboard, I realized that I didn’t know anything about how to write a recipe, how to take a photograph, how to utilize social media. It was the most frustrating, fantastic time of my life. I worked every day for hours. Click the marinara sauce link up top so that you have a clear vision of what I’m talking about. I was so slooooow. It would take me hours to create pretty bad work that at the time I thought was good enough to share with the world. Yikes! The only thing that was good were the recipes so I’ve decided to reshare a few of my favourites that my incredibly limited skill set did not do justice.

Marinara sauce is the quintessential Italian sauce with a kabillion variations. My recipe is simple, classic, quick, easy and I humbly suggest the best. It’s all about balance; too little or too much of anything will spoil the broth.

Make sure that you go for gold and buy imported Italian tomatoes. Remember how your grandmother added a spoonful of sugar to her tomato sauces. I guarantee she was using domestic tomatoes. There may be a fantastic North American supplier but I haven’t one.

MARINARA SAUCE – 4 servings

• 1 – 14 ounce best quality imported cherry tomatoes – I used Mutti because they are fantastic! This is not a paid post…
• 1 – 14 ounce best quality imported polpa [finely chopped tomatoes]
• ¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
• 2 cloves coarsely chopped garlic or to taste
• ¼ cup sliced fresh basil, leaves picked from stems
• 2 tablespoons chopped flat leaf parsley, leaves picked from stems
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• cracked pepper, to taste

METHOD

1. Heat olive in heavy bottomed skillet.
2. Add chopped garlic and gently saute. Don’t brown your garlic just let it flavour the olive oil.
3. Add both types of tomatoes along with the chopped herbs.
4. Mix well and bring to a boil.
5. Reduce heat then simmer until thickened.
6. Season with sea salt and freshly ground pepper.
7. Prepare pasta while your marinara sauce is simmering.

THE LOVE: Two important things to ensure a bright, fresh dish. DO NOT BURN YOUR GARLIC! I know I’m shouting but it’s so important. Second crucial trick is to pick the leaves from the herb stems. Some cooks chop up their herbs stems and all. Not cool. The stems are tough and bitter. Throw them on the compost.

Thanks for reading.