Are Tomatoes Over-Represented in the Fruit/Veg Sauce World?

[IndyRob]

I was in the car today and was listening to a radio voice opining on the growing of tomatoes and how to get a great yield. This immediately had me thinking how to use this yield. Tomato Sauce, of course.

Then I thought "Why do tomatoes seem to be the only fruit/veg that are used as a proper sauce? The immediate answers - Texture, moisture, tradition, taste - seemed somehow insufficient.

Of all the fruits and vegetables in the world, the tomato seems to be the only one worthy of taking the starring role in a mother sauce. Can this be?

Okay, there's applesauce, all sorts of fruit dessert sauces (but I'm thinking savory), hot pepper sauce (normally used as an ingredient, not a sauce).

I searched for "eggplant sauce" and found recipes with more tomato than eggplant. Surely there's at least one fruit/veg on the planet that is as worthy as the tomato.

Anyone? Is the tomato that unique? I'm not well traveled so I may be way off base and may benefit from your experiences.

[scubadoo97]

I would agree they are over represented. I happen to think a red bell pepper or paquillo sauce is excellent.

[maggiethecat]

Tomatoes aren't overrepresented -- they're the victims of their success. Peppers, eggplants, all those moles are not necessarily tomato based. Tomatoes are easy to work into sauces of many countries and regions -- stuffed cabbage rolls from Eastern Europe, for example. I take your interesting point, but the bounty of international tomato sauces (tomato chutney) might just be because tomatoes rule.

[David A. Goldfarb]

Eggplant can make a great sauce--dice, saute with garlic and spices of choice in olive oil until it cooks down into a sauce. Excellent with pasta.

Any vegetable that can be combined with stock to make a soup can potentially become a sauce, usually by making it thicker. I don't think it's an issue of tomatoes being overrepresented in sauces so much as the idea of sauces falling into decline in the home kitchen.

[stuartlikesstrudel]

I wonder if tomatoes are more easily preserved than some other vegetables, so the food traditions worked them into year-wide cuisine. This might just be wrong, though... i don't know what works for canning/preserving.

[jk1002]

I started playing with vegetables fruit puree's after reading Jose Garces Latin evolution cookbook. It seems that in more modern cuisine vegetable purees are replacing standard sauces every now and then.

There is also an amazing green asparagus sauce on playing with fire and water.

This is something I want to explore way way more ..... not that it's new but it just didn't make my way into my own cooking style just yet and first few attempts where really amazing.

Fresh green Pea puree with sherry and shaved frozen fois gras (David Chang) was amazing.

JK