Otherwise known in our household as “red sauce pasta” or even “awesome sauce”. I’ve mentioned it in the Fake Lasagne post but I have never posted how I make it here on the blog..
Over the years, I’ve made this sauce many different ways, chopping up the various vegetables and so forth. My most recent version involves blending carrot and zucchini in the blender and this makes the sauce extra awesome in my opinion, plus, it is a lot simpler vegetable preparation wise. I’m making it in quite large batches so I can make 3x dinners and 3-4 lunches out of one very large pot of sauce.
I don’t have a strict recipe or amounts, but here is what I usually put in it when making the large batch – I’ve put notes in for how much I use when making a smaller batch.
2 teaspoons minced garlic, 1 chopped onion, 2 chopped leeks – many spices eg paprika, cinnamon, basil, parsley, oregano – sweat these together for 5-10 minutes in olive oil then remove from pan. Remove 1 leek if making a small batch (eg using 500g mince instead of 1 Kilo)
2 red capsicum (pepper) chopped – sweat this for 5-10 minutes in olive oil then remove from pan. (Use 1 if making a small batch)
1kg mince – you can choose what kind of mince you prefer. I like beef and chicken or just beef. I place this in the pan, break it up, then cover with red wine plus a dash of white wine, then put on the lid and allow it to simmer well for 15 minutes. If you have used chicken mince you will find it takes on the colour of the red wine via this method. (500g for small batch)
Add back in the capsicum, leek and onions. Stir well.
Add in 4-5 large carrots and 3 small zucchini – this I puree well in the blender, but if you prefer it chopped you can do it that way. I just peel the carrots and chop them and the zucchini into large chunks and add a little water to make blending easier but if you don’t mind the skins on the carrots, that is your option and you can skip the peeling step.. 2 carrots, 1 small zucchini for small batch.
You can also add other vegetables if you like – me personally I would add mushrooms and olives but the other half does not like them, so I tend to add those in when I am reheating a small serve of sauce for myself.
I find the puree adds extra awesomeness to the sauce. Stir well and allow all of the added ingredients to simmer together for 10 minutes.
Now add –
1 x jar of tomato paste
1 x jar of Basilico pasta sauce
1 x jar of Passata – not for small batch
1 x tin of chopped tomatoes (today I used another jar of passata as we were out) – not for small batch
1 x jar of red peppers pesto – not for small batch
Stir well, then leave the sauce to simmer on a smaller burner for an hour or more, stirring occasionally..
When the sauce is simmered together until it forms an awesome sauce, you can use it however you like.
I will usually prepare this in the morning, have a little sauce over boiled and mashed potato for lunch, and put the rest of the sauce into containers and into the fridge for later use. We would usually have red sauce pasta for dinner that evening. I would also make Fake Lasagne with this sauce, and Ricotta, Spinach and Bacon cannelloni, which will appear here as a recipe at a future time. :)
I’ve learned a new word: mince. In the US it’s “ground meat.” In my husband’s family it’s “chopped meat”; it’s a great source of contention between us. My argument is that the meat is put through a grinder. It’s not chopped! Hmmmm…I’ll have to start saying mince and see what happens. LOL
We call it a mincer, which is why it is mince. :) The different meanings for words in various countries can be very confusing at times. I remember when my Dad woke up from surgery in Hawaii, the nurses asked him where he was, and he said “In the boot of Mum’s car”. They had no idea what a boot was and they came to ask us, we figured out they call it a trunk, and then they asked if we regularly kept him in there, lol! :)
This sounds SO good, especially over mashed potato. Om nom nom.
Leah – I do make a lovely vegetarian version of this also too! In that case I just crank up the veg a little bit more and it is usually just me eating it so I can stuff it full of mushrooms, spinach, kale, silverbeet and olives. :)
Will try this!
It is awesome. :) Enjoy!
Love the title! Much as my partner makes the bolognese sauce, but without leeks. Maybe I should suggest them.
I have a bit of a reaction to onions these days and for a lot of recipes we have switched over to leeks only, but I still like to add a little onion to this and because I am making a lot, it does not seem to cause the same issues for me. :)
This sauce sounds amazing and very healthy. It could be used in so many dishes!! I’m with you on the mushrooms and black olives, love them!
Sometimes I add anchovies in with the onions and garlic but only when it is for me, because the other half does not like those bony fish. :) Without meat this can go over chicken as chicken cacciatore, too. ;)
Oh man…this sauce makes me cry a little inside because it looks SO delicious, but due to terrible acid reflux, I can not longer have red sauce (or any tomatoes)! I will have to pass this one along to the family though because they would love this!
Hey Morgan!
I used to have acid reflux pretty bad and had to steer clear of tomatoes and anything with pastry. On a trip to Hawaii I found Tums. I mean we have something similar here, Quick-eze – but it tastes like eating a piece of chalk and tums are much better tasting and seem to work a lot better for me. I brought home a couple of packets the first trip, the second trip I brought home a large container, and then my friend Sephyroth shipped me the Costco version with two very large containers. If it is really bad I’ll chew two of them but most of the time one fixes it for me. :)
Lovely to see you here.. :)
Oh Tums…I have a wonderful relationship with this stuff. It helps me a little, but I eat 2-3 of them at a time and still can’t have too much acid! I go through those things like candy (just bought more yesterday actually!). I was on a prescription med as well, but it didn’t help. The only thing I can really do is just stay away from it unfortunately! Doesn’t mean that I can’t enjoy a few bites here and there though ;)
I really love the taste of the US Tums because ours are like 10 times more chalky. I always get forest fruits. :)
Red wine AND white wine? I’ve never heard of both being used in one recipe before. since I don’t like wine I never cook with it anyway. i know the alcohol burns off, it’s the flavour I don’t like.
Have you tried using pork&veal mince?
I’m making a big batch of savoury mince today and freezing individual serve portions for future meals.
For pasta I usually make my sauce meat-less, then if I feel like meat on the day, I can add a half serve of the savoury mince from the freezer.
I don’t like wine at all and I never used to cook with it. But we continually were receiving these bottles of wine and I figured I might as well use them up and put them in sauces. I also cannot drink alcohol these days – my liver does not enjoy it, I get a headache instead of a buzz and I fall asleep 45 minutes later
One day, I opened a bottle of Banrock Station Cabernet Merlot and used it in the sauce and that was the best red sauce I had ever made. The flavours in the wine just worked incredibly well. I bought the Sauvignon Blanc and tried it in my white sauce and that was the best white sauce I ever made. Now I go through a cask of the white once a month or so – I use it for almost every recipe I make involving chicken – and the red once every 2 months.
We got to visit the winery when we drove back to Adelaide a few years back and we really loved every wine we tried there. I could actually taste the different notes in the wine. :)
I like the idea of the extra vegetables. I think I’d be more inclined to use them in my basic tomato sauce than my meat sauce. Not sure why, really. Stay tuned, I’m in the process of perfecting a very rich meat sauce – one to only eat now and then. It’s getting close. I wonder how the extra veg would work in it? I may have to give that a try as a variable. :)
Zazzy – I think you would find that the vegetables add quite a richness of their own – it would be worth a try to see how it works. :)
Awesome recipe and blog post title!
Thanks so much for sharing it. I love the addition of leeks especially.
SSG xxx
Leeks have been a reliable replacement for onions for me in a lot of my recipes. I find if I eat too much onion, bad things happen to me. :) Aldi have a great set of two in a packet with the massive tops cut off, which I usually buy.
This looks so good
Thanks Chef!