As winter presses on, I found myself out of scratch made marinara sauce, so I reached for a can to make up for the loss.  I couldn’t even eat the sauce from the can.  What have I been eating my whole life!?!  I’d only been on the fresh made stuff for about two years.  I didn’t realize how different fresh vs. canned is.  Luckily, my local Cardenas market had a screaming deal on romas.  Not fresh picked from the field like I had in October, but I’ll take it.  I hope you like this sauce as much as I do.

Easy Oven Roasted Marinara Sauce

5 lbs tomatoes (about a colander’s worth), rinsed, cored and quartered
3 onions, sliced
12 cloves garlic (more if you like more)
dried or fresh basil
dried or fresh oregano
dried or fresh thyme
dried or fresh Italian parsley
dried or fresh rosemary
olive oil
kosher salt
pepper

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Coat the bottom of two glass dishes with olive oil.  On the bottom of the pans, make a nice layer of onion and put garlic cloves on top.

Sprinkle onion/garlic with basil, oregano, thyme, parsley and rosemary.

Place tomatoes on top, drizzle with more olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Roast pan in oven until tops of tomatoes start to char a bit.  Around 45 minutes.

Remove pan from oven and place one end on a trivet.  Scoop solid materials into the higher end of the pan, allowing juices to flow to the lower side.  Let cool.

Spoon solid materials into a blender and puree.  This is the sauce.  But don’t throw away that liquid either!  At CPM we call that marinara stock and we use it to flavor soups, rice, pasta water, etc.  And it’s awesome.

Eat Well!

~Tris