Reply #26: Marinara is easy, quick, and light.

[patcox2]

Its very easy. Here's a 5 minute recipe:

2 tablespoons olive oil, in a saute pan.

3 or 4 garlic cloves, chopped or sliced very thin if yiou like, add to the oil and sweat gently, do not, under any circumstances, brown chopped garlic, it turns bitter and nasty; just sorta fry it very gently for a minute or two.

Add a large can of either crushed, or chopped tomatoes, or whole tomatoes that you crush with your hands, the imported italian brands are better.

Add a handfull of chopped fresh basil.

Cook about 5 minutes, thats it. Add salt and pepper to taste. Don;t be afraid to add what might seem a scary amount of salt to a home made sauce, I guarantee it will be less than what you get in a pre-made sauce.

Thats a serious point, many cooks starting out with "do it yourself" make it from scratch recipes have been drilled with this "salt is evil" thing. When you cook from scratch, you have to add salt, and it might seem like a lot, but trust me, its less than you get in a canned sauce or a sauce you buy in the restaurant. Shaking from the shaker won't do it, we are talking a teaspoon at a time (taste between and stop when it works for you). There is this magic moment when you have added just the right amount of salt and suddenly the flavor explodes. Go for it.

Add a bunch of hot pepper flakes an cook a while and its "fra diavolo." Add some anchovies and olives or maybe some capers and its "Putanesca," which means "whore sauce," sicilians are so respectful of women.

But its easy. come over and I will show you how.
Anything more elaborate than that is not a marinara, its a sauce ro a gravy, thats different.