For Nonni. Carmina. Our Matriarch.
Nestled between Naples and Rome lies the Province of Frosinone, Italy. A quaint region home to the Guastaferro Family, my mother’s family, and the origin of ‘the sauce.’ A sauce unlike any other. For over 100 years and four generations, this recipe and tradition has been nurtured and passed down, eventually ending up traveling the Atlantic to Arthur Avenue, The Bronx, and beyond.
This tale of tomatoes brings us to a single day a year—tomato day. Where over 500-600 pounds of Roma Tomatoes are sourced, at the most optimal time of harvest, mid to late August.
The recipe? Nothing but Tomatoes, Salt, and Basil—the tomato is king.
Our family’s tomato sauce recipe is not only about the tomato, it is a celebration of family, tradition, legacy, love, community, and nourishment. It’s not gravy to us, its sauce. It’s always been sauce.
Ingredients
25 lbs Ripe Roma Tomatoes, cleaned well
Mortons Iodized Salt, to taste.
Fresh Basil Leaves (washed well and patted dry)
Directions
Prepare the jars. Mom always runs them through the dishwasher prior to using them. Place a leaf or two of fresh basil in each jar. Line them up for later.
Clean the tomatoes. Soak in water, clean very well. Cut away any rot if you can, to salvage the good parts of the tomato. Smell the tomato before keeping it. You will know if it is bad.
On a cutting board with a knife, remove the “coolie,” not to be confused with the butt of the tomato. For some reason in our house, we called the top of the tomato the coolie.
Rough cut the tomato. Place in a large bowl. Once the bowl is filled with cut tomatoes. Get your hands in there and squeeze. This is critical. You need to soften the tomato and release the juices. This will prevent your pot from burning. You need that liquid.
ACT 1: THE FIRST COOK
Once you’ve got enough cut tomatoes to fill a stock pot, bring this pot to a boil over high heat. Continue stirring to prevent burning. It happened to us one year. It was a disaster, I will never forget Mom’s disappointment. We used a new pot, it was an outsider. It wasn’t Mom approved. We ended up with some black specs in the sauce that year, it was a rough year. Stir your pot. Once it comes to a boil, lower heat to a low simmer and let this cook for 15-20 minutes to fully cook the tomatoes and break down all that goodness.
To pass or not to pass. This is where your food mill or machine-powered tomato press comes into use. For years, we never did this step. Nonni would not approve. The tradition was to not pass the tomatoes before jarring. In some other universe, at the Ammaturo household, you could technically salt the boiled tomatoes at this step and place them in the prepared jars right now for canning. At some point though, you will need to pass them through a food mill to remove the skins and seeds. For decades we would do this right before using them. Break out every jar, open them, and pass them. Then cook a meal. I was already exhausted before even cooking. This had to stop. Now we pass on the same day. We are same-day passers.
ACT 2: THE PASSING
If you are going to do this in bulk, I highly recommend the machine-powered tomato press. We run the cooked tomatoes through this a couple of times to remove all the seeds and skin. Everything is VERY hot, so be careful. If you do not want to invest in a machine-powered press, the hand-cranked food mill I recommend above will do just well. Whatever your weapon, the key is to extract as much tomato gold as possible, leaving the skins and stems behind.
ACT 3: THE FINAL COOK
Now that you’ve got liquid gold. It’s time to bring your tomato juice to a rolling boil again. This is important for the jarring process. Heat and now my favorite part. Salt. This is where it gets nearly impossible to capture the recipe, but I will try my best. You need to salt this very large collection of boiling tomato juice. The salt is not only for taste but most importantly for preserving. My mom has been making me taste the salt level for years, training me on what balance is. We are talking about a healthy serving of salt. For this large of a pot, roughly a 1/4 cup. The goal is to just taste the salt on your tongue. I recommend tasting the sauce pre-salting to get an idea of what the raw sauce tastes like. It should be very acidic, these are tomatoes. Add salt. Taste.
You want your tongue to tingle just a bit with the level of salt.
ACT 4: FILL ME UP
Now that you’ve got perfectly salted red gold. It’s time to funnel this into your prepared jars. The basil is just waiting there for its bath. We use a funnel and make sure to fill just to the top, a few millimeters from the rim.
Mom recommends gloves for this. It’s hot. Once filled. Seal tightly with the airtight lid and metal band that the mason jars come with or that you sourced to match up with what you have. Really seal the jar. The gloves or a dishtowel come in handy to make sure they are tight. These are left to cool down and then stored on a shelf in the basement for the next 365 days. If they last.
This is our sauce. I can’t guarantee it will taste just like Mom made it, but it will be close. Make it your own. Bring this to your family. Nonni’s sauce will never be the same. Her kitchen could only produce that sauce, but this is now mine. It will continue. Thank you Nonni, thank you Mom.
Nick
xo
