I have taken to experimenting with my red sauce. This time, after the tomatoes and garlic had enough time to sweat, cook, and reduce, I took out the bay leaves and used a stick blender to puree everything, then added browned meat, mushrooms (raw but rinsed because I wanted all their juiiiiicues and glutamic acids), seasonings, and carrot bits.
Carrots are your friend in tomato sauces. They provide sugar and fiber to soak up the tomatoes’ acidity, buffering what could be a watery, astringent mess. You don’t need to use white sugar if you add chopped-fine or grated carrots, and the result in the finished sauce is ever so subtle but unignorable.
I’ll be using the red sauce to make lasagna in a crock pot today, and I’m looking forward to it. I will not be making the noodles by hand; I do have some limits.
It’s kind of funny, because I hate lasagna…but that’s a story for another day.
Welcome to the weekend, chickadees.
Also try beets in a sauce – does the same as carrots and gives some depth to the color.
Huh. I find that beets often taste like dirt, and their presence in a dish adds that tang. How does one deal with that?
My grandmother swears by red wine in tomato sauce instead of sugar…it’s what I’ve been using for many years, and I like it!