Tomato Pasta Sauce

Welcome to a special blog post with an even special recipe. As I already mentioned in my previous post that I was blessed by Mother Nature this summer and had a handsome harvest. This year I also tried my hand in growing a variety of indeterminate yellow cherry tomatoes for the first time, and oh boy! what an experience it was! As the name suggests, the variety keeps growing its branches without any limit and the two tiny plants took over (almost) one-third of my garden in no time. They were kind of late to fruit and when finally the bushes were full of little beauties, it was almost Fall! You can probably well imagine, I was overwhelmed with an abundance supply of ripe tomatoes.

Then, came the task of using this plethora of tomatoes that we harvested in only 2 days. I did freeze some of them for later use, shared some with friends, and still left with several pounds. I just didn't want to make salsa; I was looking to make something that can be stored. After a little bit of internet research, I decided to make this pasta sauce. After all, it's not written in anywhere that pasta sauce cannot be any other color than red!!

The end result was better than my expectation. This sauce is much creamier than a typical red pasta sauce and because of roasting, it is so full of flavour. Bonus, this sauce not only tastes good with pasta, you can use it with chicken or shrimp marinade as well.

Tomato Pasta Sauce

Ingredients:

Yellow Cherry tomatoes* – 1kg

Onion – 1 large, cut into large dice **

Garlic – 6/7 cloves

Extra virgin olive oil – 2 tbsp.

Salt & Pepper - to taste

Sugar - to taste ***

Basil – 2tbsp(fresh)/ 1tbsp(dried) ****

Process:

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F/180°C, and line a baking tray with parchment paper.

2. Place the tomatoes, onions, and garlic on the prepared tray.

3. Drizzle olive oil, and season with salt and pepper to taste. Mix well.

4. Place the tray in the oven, and roast until the tomatoes are wilted and lightly golden brown. It will take around 25 to 30 minutes.

5. Take the tray out from the oven and let it cool down.

6. Once cold enough to handle, transfer the roasted tomatoes and vegetables to a blender, and puree until smooth.

6. Season the sauce with additional salt and pepper to taste and add some sugar. *****

7. Stir in the basil and serve with your favorite pasta. Or store in a sterilized container and freeze for future use.

Notes:

*Any tomato of your choice can be used to make the sauce. If using big tomatoes, cut them into quarters.

**You can use shallots if you want or have in hand. In that case, you do not need to chop them.

***Depending on the tartness of your tomatoes, you need to adjust sugar.

****You can experiment with your herb. I tried making the same sauce both with basil and dried parsley and liked both the result equally.

*****Strain the sauce through a sieve to remove any traces of skin if you prefer. I skipped this step.