This wallet-friendly pasta sauce has been hailed as the “best in the world”, requiring only three ingredients that are likely already sitting in your kitchen cupboards. While there’s undoubtedly nothing quite as comforting as a generous bowl of pasta in a delicious sauce, the hectic pace of modern life means so many people are reaching for jarred varieties instead.
But there’s absolutely no need to. According to the late Italian-American culinary writer Marcella Hazan, one of the best pasta sauces can be whipped up easily and cheaply using just three ingredients. The pasta sauce recipe, originally featured in Marcella’s celebrated book Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, has subsequently been crowned “the best in the world” by food publication Delish.
The straightforward recipe calls for nothing more than tinned tomatoes, an onion and a generous knob of butter.
Alternatively, you could prepare fresh tomatoes yourself, though anyone who’s tried this will confirm it can be quite difficult, so stick with Marcella’s approach if you’re after a quick meal.
The 1992 recipe is still so popular amongst food writers and home cooks to this day. No chopping whatsoever is necessary, and pasta with tomato sauce is always a winner around the family dining table.
Marcella’s exact instructions are to place half a peeled onion into a pot alongside butter and tinned tomatoes, then leave everything to simmer gently for 45 minutes.
Sharing the recipe in her book, Marcella wrote: “No other preparation is more successful in delivering the prodigious satisfactions of Italian cooking than a competently executed sauce with tomatoes.”
In a 2016 interview with Epicurious, three years after his wife’s passing, Marcella’s husband Victor spoke candidly about his late wife’s wonderfully straightforward cooking methods.
He said: “Marcella was a genius when it came to taste. She had an immediate understanding about how flavour affects a dish.
“She asked herself, ‘Why chop an onion? Why saute? I’m going to put the onion, tomato, and butter together and forget about it’.”
Dining and Cooking