Slow Cooker Marinara Sauce

 

This is a classic homemade tomato pasta sauce recipe for the home cook which I find is one of the best sauces to have on standby in my kitchen for a quick and simple meal. Everyone needs quick dinners in their recipe repertoire, and with this sauce most of the work is already done. 

Just a few more ingredients added, and your meal can be on the table in no time at all.  It's convenient to cook it in my slow cooker for 8 hours but can be varied to many cooking methods depending on what appliances you have and like to use. I've already used it as the basic tomato sauce for a Prawn Pasta dish which was really delicious. 

 I'm using two jars (2 cups) of the sauce tonight in a quick and simple chicken pasta dish, using cooked BBQ chicken meat, perfect for an easy Sunday night's dinner, which I'm really looking forward to. This tomato sauce can form the basis of a Spaghetti Bolognaise sauce, or a Lasagne, or a whole variety of dishes really. I placed 4 jars of the sauce in the freezer, and just refrigerated the other 4. Because this will be the basic tomato sauce that is used for many dishes, I often add 1 tablespoon of extra tomato paste to the sauce for the pasta dishes. I throw in a handful of extra chopped basil, some freshly ground pepper and serve it with freshly grated parmesan cheese and more fresh basil. I am absolutely thrilled at how delicious this sauce is.

When tomatoes were in season about a month ago, I bought enough to make this sauce. They generally need to ripen even further after I buy them, but after a few days in the fruit bowl on the kitchen table, they were ready to use. With the lovely township and food bowl of Bowen, just 2 hours North of us along the Bruce Highway, we have access to beautiful tomatoes in late Winter before it gets too hot. Local fruit and vegetable shops and the markets used to sell them for as little as $2.00 a kilo, however I've only seen them for at least $3.00 a kilo this year, but then food prices are rising everywhere. When they are selling cheaply, I purchase a few kilos of them. I can always find ways to use tomatoes.

3 kilos of fresh tomatoes on the kitchen scales

Ingredients:

Makes about 8 average sized jars of sauce:

2 kilos very ripe fresh tomatoes

2 onions quartered

8 cloves garlic, peeled and cut finely

4 carrots chopped roughly

1x800 g tin tomatoes 

1 large bunch of fresh herbs (I used home grown parsley and sweet basil this time), or dried equivalent. Oregano is nice to add as well if you have it

2 bay leaves (optional) Remember to remove them at the end of the cooking time

2 generous pinches of chilli flakes or substitute finely chopped fresh 2 Capilano chillies (not hot)

40 g Extra Virgin Olive Oil

2 teaspoons vegetable stock powder

300 g water

200 g tomato paste

2 tablespoons brown sugar

2 teaspoons salt

2 teaspoons black pepper

2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

Method:

Finely chop the onion, garlic, carrot, and herbs.

Add the oil to a pan or the pot of your slow cooker and sauté the onion, garlic and carrots.

Place all the ingredients in the pot of the slow cooker and cook on low for 8 hours.

Allow to cool slightly and puree the tomato sauce if needed.

Pour into warm sterilised jars.

I think you will be seeing reference to this pasta sauce in a few of my recipes in the future, and I wanted to have it easily accessible to refer to. This isn't a post full of stylised photos or fancy ingredients, but it is a practical recipe which I think is versatile, simple to make, and a real time saver for meal preparation in your kitchen. There is no doubt that healthy home prepared sauces, relishes, chutneys, and other condiments in your refrigerator and pantry stretch your food budget further by adding flavour, interest and excitement to the simplest of recipes. 

Cook's notes:

Use 2 cups of marinara sauce per 500 g of dried pasta.

Hoping your week goes well at your place.

 Happy cooking,

Pauline