Quick Tomato Sauce Recipe – Fresh, Easy & Ready in 20 Minutes

IT TAKES JUST 20 MINUTES TO OUTDO JARRED SAUCE

Contrary to what many people think, making a great tomato sauce doesn't take hours. Long cooking time is the enemy here, robbing the tomatoes of their freshness. Along with a handful of key partners, canned tomatoes can be transformed into a sugo, not just in the time it takes to boil pasta.

Canned tomatoes, picked at the peak of ripeness, consistently taste better than the flavorless supermarket tomatoes you find most times of the year. But they do have one problem. Canned tomatoes contain the preservative citric acid, which throws off the delicate balance between sweetness and acidity found in fresh tomatoes. When using canned tomatoes to make a sauce, the job of the cook is to add back some sweet notes.

Sugar is an obvious place to start but any more than ¼ teaspoon is too much. You need subtler sources of sweetness—compounds that taste more like the natural sugars in fresh tomatoes. We tried a variety of options before settling on onions. When cooked long enough, their flavor changes from pungent to sweet. Onions actually contain long chains of fructose molecules and as the onions break down these chains are broken, allowing the natural sugars in the onions to dominate. At the same time, the volatile compounds that make raw onions so harsh are cooking off.

Slowly cooking the onions for a quick tomato sauce doesn't make much sense so we developed a method for preparing and cooking the onion that shortcuts this process to just 5 minutes.

While not as simple as opening a jar (nothing is), this sauce is a revelation. Make it a few times and you will want to commit it to memory. It's that good.

WHY Quick FRESH TOMATO SAUCE​ WORKS:

Pick the right can crushed tomatoes are our top choice for a quick sauce because they already have been puréed. Brands that list tomatoes, rather than tomato purée, as the first ingredient will have a fresher flavor. We particularly like Tuttorosso and Muir Glen crushed tomatoes.

Grate, Don't Chop
Grated onion pulp browns faster than chopped onion. The large holes of a box grater are the perfect tool for grating a peeled onion. Use a medium onion, which will easily produce the necessary amount of grated onion while still leaving a sizeable chunk in your hand (thus keeping your fingers and knuckles safe).

Butter to Start
Most tomato sauces start with olive oil. But since the flavor compounds in good olive oil are extremely volatile, even the best extra-virgin oil doesn't add much flavor when used this way. You might as well start with vegetable oil. We took another path. Sautéing the onion in butter does the best job of enhancing the flavor of the tomatoes. That's because the butter speeds the browning of the onion and contributes its own browned notes, relaying up the sweet notes in the tomatoes. The butter also adds a layer of richness.

A Brief Simmer
Simmering a simple sauce for more than 20 minutes actually dulls its flavor. You want to simmer the sauce just long enough to thicken it to the correct consistency a process that takes no more than 10 minutes when you start with crushed tomatoes.

A Fresh and Fragrant Finish
Swirling in aromatic fresh basil right before serving adds bright grassy notes and makes up for the lost fragrance of fresh tomatoes. Using olive oil to finish the sauce is the best way to capture its flavor.

Great sauce requires a little sugar and a lot of fresh basil.

Ingredients For Quick Easy Tomato Sauce:

Makes about 3 cups of sauce, enough for 1 pound of pasta

• Unsalted butter - 2 tbsp
• Grated onion - ¼ cup
• Salt and pepper
• Dried oregano - ¼ tsp
• Minced garlic, 2 cloves
• Crushed tomatoes - 1 can
• Sugar - ½ tsp
• Coarsely chopped fresh basil leaves - 2 tbsp
• Extra-virgin olive oil - 1 tbsp

Instructions For Quick Tomato Sauce With Fresh Tomatoes:

First step is to melt butter in a small or medium size saucepan over medium heat.

Add onion, ½ teaspoon salt, and oregano; cook, stirring occasionally, until liquid has evaporated and onion is golden brown, about 5 minutes.

Add garlic and cook until it becomes fragrant, about 30 seconds. Stir in tomatoes well and sugar; increase heat to high and bring to simmer. Lower heat to medium-low level and simmer until thickened slightly, for about 10 minutes. Off heat, stir in basil and oil; season with salt and pepper to taste. Serve.

Variations For Quick Sauce From Fresh Tomatoes:

Spicy Quick Tomato Sauce

Add 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes with garlic.

Creamy Quick Tomato Sauce

Add ¾ cup heavy cream to finished sauce and simmer until thickened, about 3 minutes.

Zesty Quick Tomato Sauce

Add eight minced anchovy fillets with garlic. Add ½ cup pitted and chopped olives and three tablespoons rinsed capers with basil.

Recipe Details

Timeline

• 5 minutes to prep ingredients
• 5 minutes to cook onion and garlic
• 10 minutes to cook tomatoes and finish sauce

Essential Tools

• Box grater for grating onion
• Can opener
• Medium saucepan
• Chef’s knife

Substitutions & Variations

• If you don’t have crushed tomatoes, you can substitute one 28-ounce can of whole or diced tomatoes processed with their juice in a food processor until smooth.
• This recipe can be doubled if you use a large saucepan. Note that the simmering time might be slightly longer.

Find more quick and healthy recipes in our Main Dishes section.

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