If your family is anything like mine, some sort of pasta is on the menu weekly. Pasta is delicious, most kids like it, it's fairly easy to make, and best of all--it's budget friendly and there are almost always leftovers.
You could choose from the canned/jarred variety of sauces available on the shelves of your local grocers-- but let's have some real talk here-- once you've made your own sauce, the store bought preservative type is nothing in comparison.
PLUS! It' extra high in sugar and fat. Tomato sauce alone with your own spices and herbs added, is much healthier and yummier.
Now, I'm not saying that it's all bad, some of the sauces that line the grocery store shelves are fairly good, and some are also healthy. But, unless I'm in a huge hurry, I like to make my own sauce. It costs less and tastes better :)
I have a growing family of six. If I'm going to make homemade pasta sauce, I usually want it to be enough to feed us at least twice--seriously--who wants to cook every night?!
This recipe will feed my family at least three times, usually four.
I often freeze what's leftover after we've eaten it twice. Leftover sauce freezes great! Just use it within a month or so. When you're ready to have it, take it out of the freezer and plop it into the crockpot mid-morning. By dinner time, it's ready!
If I were buying store bought sauce, not only would it not freeze well for leftovers, it would also cost me more to make. That's the cost of convenience! Good health and hard earned dollars!
I would need to purchase two to three jars per time I was making a pasta-- and I'm cheap. $1.89 for a 20 oz. can is the lowest price I have found for canned sauce, and it's really not that great--at all. It tastes somewhere between potted meat tomato flavor and Speghettios. You get what you pay for! Even though it's cheap, it's not tasty.
$1.89 (cost of canned Hunt's brand sauce) multiplied by 3 (how many cans I need) multiplied by 4(number of weeks in a month) comes out to a grand total of $22.68 per month for pasta sauce. This may not seem like much, but the tomato sauce I buy (Great Value, Wal Mart store brand) is $1.08/can and 29oz.
That's more sauce per can, which means I only need two cans of sauce instead of three and the cost for pasta once a week for a month is $8.64/month instead of $22.68!
It's a win-win y'all.
Tomato sauce and herbs and spices in your own sauce are much cheaper....and healthier.
Now that we've had this talk, and a math lesson--
Here is how I do it--
Keep in mind that I DO NOT consider sauce making, or most cooking for that matter to be an exact science. Baking, you gotta be careful...everything else... forget the measuring cups, spoons, and such.... they aren't important. You don't learn to be a good cook by following recipes, you get there by experimentation and trying your own twist on basic stuff.
Although it's not a must, a good nonstick pan/pot is best to use when making sauce. It's not necessary, but you don't want your sauce to stick to the bottom and scorch--it will not be good. Plus non stick makes clean up a breeze! I recently purchased Pioneer Woman Cookware, I LOVE this cookware! I have had more expensive cookware that didn't cook/clean up as good as this! Plus you get an iron skillet with your pots and pans, and a little recipe booklet. Awesome! To grab your own, I've included the following affiliate link. To check it out, click here!
So here is what you will need:
2 cans of tomato sauce, 29oz each ( I use great value)
2 lbs of ground beef or turkey ( so basically a pound of meat, per can of sauce)
Garlic salt
Onion Powder
Salt and Pepper
Fresh or not: Parsley, Oregano, and Basil
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| My pretty large skillet from Pioneer Woman! Love this cookware! |
Simple instructions:
**Warning: I don't measure, so these are guesstimates! I encourage you to make guesstimates when you make your sauce too!
This is how you make it your own :)
Brown ground beef, sprinkle garlic salt and onion powder lightly on meat as it cooks
Once good and browned, drain meat, and put it back in the skillet/pot/whatever you are using.
Pour tomato sauce over meat
If you are using dry spices..like what you buy at the store, go ahead and sprinkle them in
A heavy dash of garlic salt
Another slightly heavy dash of onion powder
Dash of salt and pepper
2 tsp of parsley
1.5 tsp of oregano
1-1.5 tsp of basil
**only use one or the other--dried spices or fresh--not both! :)
If you're using fresh:
3-4 leaves of basil
3 -5sprigs of parsley
2-3 sprigs of oregano
Before chopping fresh leaves, roll them in your palms to release their flavorful aromatic oils, then remove leaves from the stems and chop them up and throw them in. You can chop and throw the stems in also, but they sometimes cause a bitter taste, so I don't recommend it.
Now throw the half a stick of butter in on top and put a lid on. The butter is optional, but really does make it yummy.
Turn the burner on medium and bring to a slight bubbley boil, allowing the butter to melt and all the spices to blend together.
Once it's bubbled for about 5 minutes, turn the burner down to low and allow the sauce to simmer for a while.
I like to let mine simmer for a few hours, but sometimes that's not possible. The longer it simmers the more flavorful and delicious it will be, but 45 minutes or so will do if you have time-- or your kids and or husband are being whiney and claiming you're trying to starve them out.
About 20 minutes before serving, cook noodles of your choice according to package directions. Spiral noodles are one of my family's favorite! If you're feeding a lot of people and want it to go a little further, I recommend making it into a pasta bake...which is basically where you mix the sauce and cooked noodles together, pour them in a 13x9 pan, cover it with cheese and bake at 350 just until the cheese is nice and melted. It's super yummy this way! Rigatoni and penne noodles are especially good in a pasta bake!
Serve with garlic bread and salad if you have it on hand :)
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| My food is never pretty, but it's always delicious |
So there you have it! A nice easy pasta sauce! Remember to play around with it! Make it your own!
Have any questions or comments? Leave them below! And don't forget to share this post if you enjoyed it!
Happy Sauce Making :)
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