Fiscal Responsibility

Cracchiola Family Sauce

This is for a big pot. I've never made a small pot. I learned the measures by the handful and the pinch, but the amounts here were measured.

3 16 oz. cans tomato paste
6 TB olive oil
6 cloves garlic, minced
1 TB salt
2 TB pepper (adjust to taste-if my aunts were caught up in a soap opera while cooking, more seemed to get added)
3 TB dried basil
1 TB dried oregano (too much and you'll have pizza sauce!)
1 TB dried parsley
1 TB sugar (Aunt Eleanor added some sugar, Aunt Pat added none. Add as you need to cut the acidity of the tomatoes.)
4 1/2 qts. water
1 lb. ground beef, pork, veal, or a mix of all three (the beef will make a heavier sauce; the pork and veal make for a lighter, sweeter sauce), we used ground beef
Other meat: meatballs, sausage, pork butt, etc. to your own taste

If you're making meat sauce, brown the meat and set aside in a colander to drain the fat. Cover the bottom of a large stock pot with the olive oil and sweat the garlic (cook over low heat to prevent browning) until soft. Add the tomato paste and water (you may want to do this off the heat so the paste doesn't stick to the bottom of the pan). Then, stir as the paste melts and mixes with the water over medium heat. Add all of the other ingredients except the ground meat. Stir, turn up the heat and bring to a boil. Lower the heat to a simmer and add the ground meat, if you're making meat sauce. Simmer and stir often over the next 2 hours. The water will evaporate and the sauce will thicken. Taste along the way to see if it needs more salt and pepper. Feel free to dunk some bread in and taste too. It's part of the fun and ritual. Add any meatballs, sausage, pork, etc. to the sauce to heat in the last 30-60 minutes. I always brown these separately and let them finish cooking in the sauce.

Prep. time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 2 hours
Yield: 6 qts.

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  David Walker: Page 1 - Page 2
  Alison Acosta Fraser: Page 1 - Page 2 - Page 3
  Belle Sawhill: Page 1 - Page 2 - Page 3
  Chris Swann: Page 1 - Page 2 - Page 3
  Carl Tannenbaum: Page 1 - Page 2 - Page 3

Recipes:   Lemon Chicken | Rachel's Omelet | Corn Pudding | Marinated Filet Mignon | Asian Pork Tenderloin and Coconut Jasmine Rice | Grilled Chicken Breasts | Steak au Poivre | Pretzel Salad | End of Spring Beef Stew | Chicken Tarragon | Roasted Sweet Potatoes | No Bowl Cake | Chris and Aunt Mary's Stromboli | Aunt Pat's Pizza Meat | Cracchiola Family Sauce | Chris's Baked Ziti | Aunt Eleanor's Spedini | Post-Thanksgiving Gumbo | Singapore Rice Noodles | Red Chili and Orange Barbecue Sauce | Tandoori-style Grilled Chicken