Marinara: Cornerstone of Southern Italian Cuisine

I

'm surprised that once again—with this incarnation of Skip's Italian Food Blog—the most common question readers ask is, "Do you have a good recipe for tomato sauce?" I've been answering this question since 1994, when I started my first Web site: northend.com. The answer is, "Yes I do."

What I've found to be more surprising, though, is the tone of the e-mails. The writers suggest that marinara, tomato sauce, is some kind of elusive holy grail. In my opinion, this couldn't be further from the truth. And in Emeril Lagasse's words, "It ain't rocket science."

But thinking further, it occured to me that in addition to being a fine sauce in its own right, marinara forms the basis for a significant portion of the southern Italian and Sicilian cuisines. So it's worthwhile to develop a recipe you really like. When you've done that, you'll have the wherewithal to turn it into a panoply of Italian dishes, and save approximately thirty minutes of cooking time for each of them.

I wrote in my first cookbook, La Cucina dei Poveri, that my grandmother always seemed to have some tomato sauce on hand that she used for a variety of recipes having nothing to do with pasta. For example, a judicious ladleful over some sautéed zucchini; or "just enough to color" some cannellini; or a dollop of sauce over some of her superb rice cakes. And even when she served marinara over pasta, she would poach three or four eggs in the sauce, and serve them atop the pasta.

Italian restaurant chefs always have a pot of marinara bubbling gently on the back burner, ready to become any one of a myriad of Italian sauces. If the restaurant has an open kitchen, you might be able to watch the chef sauté some garlic in olive oil, add a handful of calamari, perhaps some red pepper flakes, then a ladleful of marinara, and voilà: pasta with calamari. And in only about four minutes.

When I make marinara, I make at least double my original recipe. It keeps perfectly well in the refrigerator for a week or ten days. Given a week to think about it, you can always find a reason to use the leftover. And while I don't advocate freezing anything, I'm told that it keeps well in the freezer for up to six months.

Here then, are a very few dishes that become available when you've mastered basic marinara sauce:

♦ Pasta all' Amatriciana
Pasta with guanciale and onion. Note: Guanciale is air-cured hog jowl. If you can't find it at your local Italian deli, you can substitute salt pork. If you're a real purist, though, you can order it from the great folks at Niman Ranch.

♦ Pasta al' Arrabiata
Pasta with spicy tomato sauce. (Literally, "angry" pasta).

♦ Pasta con Calamare
Pasta with squid in tomato sauce.

♦ Pasta alla Boscaiolo
Pasta with mushrooms and tomato sauce (Literally, Woodsman's-style pasta).

♦ Canelloni
Rolled, stuffed pasta.

♦ Pasta Ripieno
Stuffed shells.

♦ Melanzane alla Parmigiana
Eggplant Parmesan.

Of course, these few dishes barely suggest the possibilities for using marinara in your kitchen. Once you've tried a few, I'm sure you'll find dozens more you'll want to cook.

And in nearly every recipe, it's simply a matter of sautéeing some ingredients, adding the marinara and heating it through, and you're done. While I'm not averse to spending two or three hours fussing over recipes, this is my kind of day-to-day cooking.

Buon appetito!

My Grandmother's Marinara

Ingredients:

Olive oil
4 Cloves garlic, peeled, and thinly sliced
2 28 oz. Cans peeled tomatoes (preferably San Marzano)
1 Small carrot, finely shredded
1/2 tsp. Red pepper flakes
2 Tbs. Fresh oregano, finely chopped
2 Tbs. Fresh basil, finely chopped
1/4 Cup Flat-leaf Italian parsley, finely chopped
Salt & freshly-ground black pepper

Preparation:

Heat a three or four quart pot over medium heat, then add enough olive oil to cover the bottom. Add the garlic, and sauté, shaking the pot for about one minute, until the garlic begins to give up its aroma.

Remove the pot from the heat and add the tomatoes. Return the pot to the heat and begin to break the tomatoes with either the back of a fork, or a wooden spoon. Simmer the tomatoes to evaporate some of the liquid, then add the carrot, the red pepper flakes and the oregano.

Simmer gently for about twenty minutes, or until the sauce has thickened and the clear liquid from the tomatoes has evaporated.

Add the basil and parsley, and season with salt and pepper.

Makes approximately 1 1/2 Quarts.