Red Sauce

[NulloModo]

I have a serious hankering for a chicken-parm. sub this evening, alas I can not endulge because:

a.) I am on a low-carb diet, and every little Italian join that delivers the little beauties serves 'em up with breaded chicken (which is how they should be), and of course have no low-carb rolls, which I wouldn't expect them to.

But this is not a problem because...

b.) I am too stubborn to order something that seems simple enough that I could learn how to cook myself anyway.

I have the rolls, I have a means of 'breading' the chicken, but alas, I now realize that I do not know how to make the ubiquitous 'red sauce' which is somewhat akin to Marinara which is served up in every little dime-a-dozen Italian sub/steak/pasta/pizza joint.

Recipegullet is empty of solutions, and I discovered none of the sauce courses in the eGCI cover this type of course. A quick look around google shows a bunch of different recipes, with very different ideas, but most seem to call for all dried herbs and canned tomatoes, surely I can do better.

I turn to you, eGullet, to share your more flavorful cooked from scratch recipes for Italian style red-sauce. I would prefer something using all fresh ingredients, including all fresh tomatoes (no canned or paste), unless those products really do somehow make it taste better...

[Behemoth]

Recipegullet is empty of solutions, and I discovered none of the sauce courses in the eGCI cover this type of course.  A quick look around google shows a bunch of different recipes, with very different ideas, but most seem to call for all dried herbs and canned tomatoes, surely I can do better.

I turn to you, eGullet, to share your more flavorful cooked from scratch recipes for Italian style red-sauce.  I would prefer something using all fresh ingredients, including all fresh tomatoes (no canned or paste), unless those products really do somehow make it taste better...

As far as using fresh tomatoes -- I don't know where you are located but for most parts of the country good plum tomatoes are not available until late summer. In most cases I think it is really hard to beat a good quality can of canned san marzano tomatoes. I've used this brand and liked it:

link

As far as fresh-made. Marcella Hazan has a red sauce that is great & very easy. You basically simmer what seems to be way too much sliced garlic in tomatoes & evoo for a while, then thrown in a fistful of basil at the end. Awesome, very fresh tasting. To not offend the copyright gods I could PM it to you, if you want.

Edited June 13, 2004 by Behemoth (log)

[Malawry]

My spouse is a huge fan of chicken parm, and we both are doing the low-carb thing. I make tomato sauce for chicken parm this way:

Sweat a half a medium onion (diced) in EVOO with S&P. Add two or three smashed cloves of garlic, and dashes of oregano and thyme. Add two regular cans of diced, peeled tomatoes. Cook until most of the juices have concentrated and thickened up and it's sweetened up from reduction. (I usually start it over fairly high heat and then reduce the heat as the sauce thickens.) It usually takes 10-15 minutes to cook down, long enough for me to assemble a salad and cook off the chicken breasts. I then spoon the sauce over hot cooked chicken breast, top with cheese, and pop in an oven until the cheese melts.

This makes a fairly chunky sauce, but if you want it more like what I usually see on chicken parm in your referenced dime-a-dozen joints, you can try pulsing it briefly in the food processor to break down the chunks. Or mash the sauce with the back of a wooden spoon while it's cooking. Or whatever.

A lot of cheapie restaurants use canned tomato sauce instead of making their own, and sauces in these places may be augmented by things like dried basil and corn syrup that I believe distract from the tomato flavor of a really good sauce. Sometimes, I'd add a tiny pinch of sugar to my sauce, but on the low-carb diet you probably want to avoid that--and it's usually not necessary anyway. And fresh basil is always best...chiffonaded and stirred in at the very end or, better, sprinkled over the top of the cheese after it comes out of the oven.

I am interested in hearing about how you are breading your chicken and what kind of bread you are using for sandwiches.

[NulloModo]

Thank you, those both sound like great ideas so far, and I would love to get that PM Behemoth.

For some reason I had it in my head that making a good red-sauce would be an all-day affair involving stock-bones, mysterious ingredients like pureed anchovy for hidden flavors, and other stereotypical Italian Grandmother secrets ;). I suppose there is definately nothing wrong with simple however.

Malawry -

I am breading the chicken using grated parm trick: I take the breasts, slice thin, drag through an egg wash, roll each slice around in grated pure parmesan cheese, and then toss it into a deep fryer till done. The grated parm will fuse and crisp around the breast giving a texture and color similar to breading, but with much more flavor. You can vary this by using other hard grating cheeses and spicing the mixture to give your fried chicken a slightly different character.

I am using the O'So'Lo rolls, which I have been able to find at my local Safeway. The thing I like about these is that the actual and net carb counts are both very low, they are free of any sugar-alcohol, and make use of protein isolates and flax-seed as the primary bulking agents. In color they are much darker that your usual roll, but they do taste quite good, and are very moist, with just a hint of chewiness, almost like a good potato roll.

[docsconz]

The key to a good plain tomato sauce is good tomatoes. This time of year the best bet is definately good quality canned tomatos. San Marzanos are excellent. The sauce described by Behemoth and attributed to Marcella Hazan is a basic marinara sauce, which would work fine on your sandwich. For variations you could sweat some onions with the garlic initially, mash up some anchovy in the evoo if you like or put in some red pepper flakes for a little heat. Another key is to make sure that the sauce is adequately salted. The sauce should be sweet enough from the tomatoes and onions (if used).

If you really wanted to get fancy you could make a meat sauce. First garlic, parsley and onion soffrito, brown the meat (good Italian sausage, braciole and pork), add the tomatoes (puree is fine for this) and perhaps a little water and let simmer over low heat for as long as you can (at least a few hours), stirring occassionally. Good meat is key.

[Pan]

Another good thing to add to the sauce are mushrooms. I haven't cooked pasta sauce for some time, but I always included at least a whole ~8-oz. container of mushrooms in my sauce.

[NulloModo]

Ah success!

I went off to the farmers market today and found a bounty of quite ripe tomatoes, so I decided to go ahead and make the sauce from fresh.

An onion diced with several cloved of garlic in EVOO started things off. I let these sizzle and flavor the oil as I pureed a food processor full of tomatoes, several sprigs worth of rosemary leaves, some more garlic, parsely, and a package of mushrooms. Once combined but still a bit chunky this all went in with the onions and garlic and slow cooked for about two hours.

The chicken came out crispy, golden brown, and very flavorful deep fried with the parmesan crust, and the roll was just right. On the side was sauteed fresh asparagus in EVOO and garlic.

After my total failure cooking tripe, I needed something like this to get my spirits back up ;). This is most definately something I will add to my repertoire, for it produced the most flavorful chicken parm sandwhich that I have ever consumed. Thanks for all the great suggestions.

[Malawry]

Wow, that looks great!

[albie]

Nullo, here's one suggestion...

Basic Tomato Sauce (with options marked by asterisk*)

¼ cup extra virgin olive oil (1 tablespoon oil variation)

1½ cups Spanish onion, diced about ¼”

*One medium carrot, diced about ¼”

*One medium red bell pepper, diced about ¼”

Two 28-ounce cans of whole peeled tomatoes.

½ cup dry white wine, preferably unoaked

*2 tablespoons concentrated tomato paste, imported in tubes

*2 tablespoons (capfuls) of balsamic vinegar

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

3-4 tablespoons fresh herbs, chopped (my favorites are basil and flat-leaf parsley, but thyme, marjoram, rosemary, and oregano are also used )

salt and fresh-ground black pepper, to taste

In a dutch oven (heavy-bottomed, lidded, enameled, non-reactive cast iron pot, i.e. Le Creuset) or a saucepan of about six-quart capacity, begin by combining the onion, garlic and, if used, the similarly diced carrots and bell pepper with the olive oil, salt and pepper. Sauté these on medium-low heat for about ten minutes, until soft and the onions are pale but translucent.

If using the tomato paste, turn up the heat that this point and stir the paste into the sautéed veggies until it cooks slightly; if necessary deglaze the pan, loosening and stuck-down bits of flavor with a wooden spoon or spatula, adding the optional balsamic vinegar at this point, any perhaps even a splash of the optional wine or a couple tablespoons of water to help out.

At this point, pull the pot off the heat as you decide on the sauce’s texture. Like it silky smooth? If you want it really chunky texture, then simply add the tomatoes to the pot after having squished them by hand as finely—or as coarsely -- as you like.

Like it silky smooth? Then puree a mixture of veggies and the canned tomatoes in several moderate batches in a blender or food processor, being careful not to overload as it can get messy. We’ve also learned that adding a bit of the optional wine, or a few drops of water can serve to lighten the mixture and facilitate the blending.

Whatever its texture, we now get it all into the pot, add the wine (if desired) and simmer at medium-low heat, partially covered for at least 20 minutes. At this point we taste for salt and pepper, adjust if necessary, mix in our fresh herbs and decide whether to shut it down or simmer for a few minutes longer.

[pork]

I also use quality canned tomatoes to make my red gravy. Good fresh tomatoes are just not available year-round, and I make sauce twice a month usually.

I vary my recipe a little every time, depending on my mood, but it is pretty similar to the recipes above. I use a little carrot and red wine in mine for the sugar.

Last time I did it, I was reading the French Laundry cookbook while the sauce was simmering, so when it was cooked, I pureed it with a stick blender and strained it. That was fun because the resulting sauce was much smoother and thinner in texture, but missing none of the flavor. I served it with a simple rigatoni and loved it. Usually I leave it chunky but variety is the spice of ...well tomato sauce, in this case.

[-sheila mooney]

Nullo, here's one suggestion...

Basic Tomato Sauce (with options marked by asterisk*)

¼ cup extra virgin olive oil (1 tablespoon oil variation)

1½ cups Spanish onion, diced about ¼”

*One medium carrot, diced about ¼”

*One medium red bell pepper, diced about ¼”

Two 28-ounce cans of whole peeled tomatoes.

½ cup dry white wine, preferably unoaked

*2 tablespoons concentrated tomato paste, imported in tubes

*2 tablespoons (capfuls) of balsamic vinegar

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

3-4 tablespoons fresh herbs, chopped (my favorites are basil and flat-leaf parsley, but thyme, marjoram, rosemary, and oregano are also used )

salt and fresh-ground black pepper, to taste

      In a dutch oven (heavy-bottomed, lidded, enameled, non-reactive cast iron pot, i.e. Le Creuset) or a saucepan of about six-quart capacity, begin by combining the onion, garlic and, if used, the similarly diced carrots and bell pepper  with the olive oil, salt and pepper. Sauté these on medium-low heat for about ten minutes, until soft and the onions are pale but translucent.

      If using the tomato paste, turn up the heat that this point and stir the paste into the sautéed veggies until it cooks slightly; if necessary deglaze the pan, loosening and stuck-down bits of flavor with a wooden spoon or spatula, adding the optional balsamic vinegar at this point, any perhaps even a splash of the optional wine or a couple tablespoons of water to help out.

        At this point, pull the pot off the heat as you decide on the sauce’s texture. Like it silky smooth? If you want it really chunky texture, then simply add the tomatoes to the pot after having squished them by hand  as finely—or as coarsely --  as you like. 

        Like it silky smooth? Then puree a mixture of veggies and the canned tomatoes in several moderate batches in a blender or food processor, being careful not to overload as it can  get messy.  We’ve also learned that adding a bit of the optional wine, or a few drops of water can serve to lighten the mixture and facilitate the blending. 

          Whatever its texture, we now get  it all into the pot, add the wine (if desired) and simmer at medium-low heat, partially covered for at least 20 minutes. At this point we taste for salt and pepper, adjust if necessary, mix in our fresh herbs and decide whether to shut it down or simmer for a few minutes longer.

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i have 6 lbs of great plum tomatoes and sauce is on the agenda for tomorrow (sun) -- i want to make a marinara and cook them chopped up with skin and seeds then use my food mill, a favourite toy, to puree the sauce. but now i have a doubt: will the sauce be too bitter if i cook the tomatoes with skin and seeds? should i peel and seed them beforehand instead? this sauce will be frozen and kept for later. thanks for any insights...

[Shalmanese]

Instead of cooking your tomatos, roast them instead. Put them halved on a sheet pan with some olive oil and put them into a hot oven. About 30 minutes before they are done, scatter on some onions and whole garlic cloves. Then run the entire thing through a food mill and you have a intense, slightly smoky, very flavourful tomato sauce and no little red splotches all over your kitchen.