Jeffrey R. Esser

My favorite pasta sauce!  It’s so easy to make your own pasta sauce and the results are so much better than out of a can that I can’t believe everybody doesn’t maket their own.  This recipe will be enough for one pound of pasta.

Ingredients:

• ¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 3 cloves garlic, roughly smashed
• ¼ tsp red pepper flakes
• ¼ cup vodka
• 1 tbsp tomato paste (I just use the 6oz whole can)
• 28 oz crushed tomatoes with basil
• 15oz tomato sauce
• pinch of sugar
• ¼ cup heavy cream
• kosher salt and black pepper

Steps:

1. In a large sauce pan, heat the olive oil over medium heat.  Add the smashed garlic and red pepper flakes, and saute until the garlic starts to turn golden around the edges.  You don’t want your garlic to get too brown.
2. Carefully add the vodka so it doesn’t splatter or ignite.  Then add the tomato paste and stir it around to break it up until it is well mixed in.  Add the remaining canned tomatoes with all of thier juices, plus the sugar.  Season liberally with salt and pepper.  I usually use over a tbsp of salt in total, but you can add more salt at the end, so be restrained.
3. Bring sauce to a boil and then lower heat to gently simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Season again with salt and pepper to taste.  Stir in the heavy cream and simmer for another 5 minutes.

Recipe adapted from Food & Wine magazine, September 2007.