oven-italian-red-sauce.md

This is basically the recipe at https://www.seriouseats.com/the-best-slow-cooked-italian-american-tomato-sauce-red-sauce-recipe

Ingredients:

• 2x 1lb whole peeled tomatoes. Recipe calls for San Marzano, I've found Trader Joe unsalted plum tomatoes / Fred Meyer Kroger plain ones to work fine.
• 4-5 tablespoon olive oil to use just in the sauce. Eyeballing is fine, I think
• 8 clove-1 head of garlic, to taste
• 1tsp red pepper flakes
• 1 tbsp oregano
• 2 carrots, peel and rough cut (2-3" logs is fine)
• 1 medium onion (yellow, chop in half)
• 2 whole basil stems with all the leaves, fresh is nice. If you don't have any, I think about 3tsp dried basil is fine

Steps:

0. Crush tomatoes with bare hands in prep bowls; this is vaguely satisfying after a day of office work... Also pre-heat oven to 350F
1. Heat olive oil on medium heat in a dutch oven or a big oven-safe pot
2. Put in red pepper flakes, oregano, garlic; light fry 2 mins until garlic looks light golden
3. Add the tomatoes
4. Bring to a bubbling simmer
5. Add carrots and onion halves, submerge them in the tomatoes
6. Put in basil stems with leaves, just on the top is fine, they'll cook down
7. Cover dutch oven with lid ajar (about 1/2 in open, or whatever balances), stick it in the oven
8. Wait 2 hours
9. Stir it a little, taste and see how you like it
10. Leave it for another hour if you like a deeper tomato sauce flavor
11. Pull out, discard carrots / onion (or eat them if you like the taste), use sauce for pasta dish, or freeze for later.

Options:

• I think using a mix of half the condensed sauce + fresher canned tomato is a nice mix, with finer diced and cooked onions
• We've used it for baked pasta with fake mozzarella and more basil
• Might work well in lasagna???