How to Make Italian Sunday sauce | Nana’s Recipe
Italian Sunday Sauce or gravy depending on where you are from in Italy was something I always looked forward to as a kid. My Nana/Mom’s recipe is actually really simple, just time-consuming.
I have already done a version of this using the instant pot to speed things up but sometimes you need to go old school.
The full Printable Recipe is always at Dadgothis.com.
Equipment
Heavy Bottomed Pot
Larger Frying Pan
Can Opener
Spatula – Metal or Hard Plastic
Ingredients
2 28 oz cans of San Marzano peeled plum tomatoes
2 6 oz cans of tomato paste
5 Italian sausages
9-12 Italian meatballs Recipe in Notes
1 tsp Onion powder
1 tbsp Garlic powder
2 tbsp Minced garlic
1 tbsp Dried Basil
Sea salt To taste (Start with 1 tbsp)
Black pepper To taste
Olive oil
Instructions
Empty two 28 ounce cans of peeled plum San Marzano tomatoes into a large heavy-bottomed pot. Crush them with your hands. Make sure you are “popping” the tomatoes with your hand submerged in the liquid or you will have a huge mess on your hands. Place the pot on a burner over low heat.
Add some olive oil to a large frying pan over medium heat. Fry the sausage for a couple of minutes per side. Take the sausage and put it in the pot with the tomatoes.
Add some extra olive oil to the pan and fry the meatballs for a couple of minutes per side until they are nice and browned. Take the meatballs and put them in the fridge.
Add 2 TBSP of minced garlic to the pan. Stir it and scrape the pan to release all the bits from frying the meats.
Add in two cans of tomato paste. Scrape and stir to mix everything into the paste and flatten it out a little bit. Let it cook for a few minutes. Let it almost burn. Once you have a nice color on the paste fill one of the tomato paste cans with water and add it to the pan. Scrape and mix well so you get everything from the pan. Pour the entire mixture into the pot with the tomatoes and sausage.
Add 1 tsp of onion powder, 1 tbsp of garlic powder, 1 tbsp of dried basil and salt and pepper to taste. Start with 1 tbsp of sea salt to start. Add as much pepper as you like to make it as spicy as you like.
Cover the pot and simmer on low for 3 hours. Make sure you are stirring it every 15 -30 minutes and that your heat is not too high. This is also where a good heavy bottom pot is important to prevent the bottom from burning. If you do not watch and stir this and it burns the bottom it will seep through the whole pot and make it bitter and terrible tasting.
After the 3 hours is up it is time to add the meatballs. This is also where you can taste the sauce and adjust any seasoning you want. Add more salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, or basil to your taste. Simmer for an additional 2 hours uncovered. You still have to watch it and make sure you are stirring every 15-30 minutes.
When the two hours are up taste the sauce and do a final seasoning adjustment. Dad’s tip is to make sure you add enough salt. Dad usually ends up doing the initial tbsp and an additional tsp or 2 of salt. A sauce with not enough salt will just taste wrong. Serve it over the pasta of your choice.
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