Gluten Free Spaghetti Sauce
Homemade Spaghetti Sauce Comment: The DNA for this recipe dates back generations ago to Atina, Italy from where our family left their farmland and migrated to the US in the late 1800's bringing with them their sons and daughters to begin life anew. With them came their recipes and some of these have been passed on from generation to generation and this spaghetti sauce recipe is one of them.  The sauce has 6 commonly found ingredients – tomatoes, tomato paste, garlic, olive oil, parsley and basil flakes and is probably one of the tastiest sauces you will ever have. We make a substantial quantity each time and freeze most for frequent use thereafter as it is a staple in our home and we simply could not get along with it. Also, at the same time you are making the spaghetti sauce you will want to make your meatballs which will be cooked in the sauce. (See HomeMade Meatballs recipe)
Cooking time: At least 4 hours
Yield: 7.0 quarts
Ingredients:
Note: If you want to make less than this recipe produces reduce ingredients in half.
7 28 ounce cans of Hunts Whole Peeled tomatoes
7 6 ounce cans Contadina Tomato Paste
1 cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil + 3 tbls
1 bulb garlic (each clove peeled and chopped fine)
1 1 ounce container of Basil Leaves (we buy our spices from CVS in small containers)
1 ½ ounce container of Parsley Flake
Salt & Pepper to taste
Preparation:
  1. Open all cans.
  2. Chop garlic.
  3. Have electric blender ready.
  4. Pour olive oil into a cup reserving the 3 tbls and have spices ready.
  5. In a 5 quart stock pot w/lid add your 3 tbls olive oil, heat but not burning hot, and add your garlic stirring until it becomes translucent. Do not burn.
  6. While garlic is cooking, add one can of tomatoes and one can of tomato paste to the blender, stir together with a spoon to mix and blend for not more than 5 seconds. Stop, let the air escape, and blend for another 2 seconds.
  7. Add the contents of the blender to the pot and stir.
  8. Repeat the blending of tomatoes & paste 3 or 4 times and then add to the pot the olive oil, Parsley and Basil, stir to thoroughly mix and repeat until all tomatoes and paste have been added.
  9. Bring the sauce to a slow, low boil and then turn it down to simmer and if you cook it 4 hours you will have what is called “black sauce” where the oil begins to rise to the top and is now “black”; when you see this happening, the sauce is cooked.
  10. Throughout the cooking process you will lose volume to evaporation so add hot tap water in the quantities that you estimate you are losing but stir the sauce frequently because the combined tomato and paste will form a heavy mixture that settles to the bottom and unless you stir it often the sauce can burn producing an unwanted taste.
  11. Our tradition is to cook the sauce 4 hours but actually the cooking process can be stopped and sauce consumed at any point along the way because all of the ingredients are ‘natural’ and by cooking you are simply blending them.
  12. Allow the sauce to cool completely, overnight in a refrigerator, stir it up then pour into 8 ounce plastic containers for freezing. When you plan to use the frozen sauce, defrost a container (or more) in a small pan w/lid adding a touch of water.