Time: 1 hour 40 minutes (mostly hands-off) · Serves: 4–6 as a pasta sauce
What you need
- 1 kg ripe tomatoes, any variety; a mix works well
- 6 garlic cloves, left in their skins
- 4 tablespoons olive oil
- Small bunch of fresh basil
- Pinch of sugar
- Salt and black pepper
Method
- Heat the oven to 160 °C / 140 °C fan / gas mark 3. This lower temperature is important, it dries and concentrates rather than burning.
- Halve the tomatoes through the middle and arrange them cut-side up in a single layer in a large roasting tin or ovenproof dish. They should fit snugly but not be piled on top of each other. Tuck the unpeeled garlic cloves among the tomatoes.
- Drizzle generously with the olive oil, do not be shy. Scatter over the pinch of sugar (this helps the caramelisation), and season well with salt and black pepper.
- Roast for 1½ hours. By the end, the tomatoes should be collapsed, jammy, and slightly caramelised and darkened at the edges. The garlic cloves should be completely soft inside their skins. If things look pale after an hour, turn the oven up by 10 °C for the final stretch.
- Remove from the oven and leave to cool for 10 minutes. Pick out the garlic cloves and squeeze the soft, sweet flesh from the skins directly into the roasting tin, it will slip out easily. Discard the papery skins.
- Add the fresh basil leaves to the tin. Now decide on your preferred texture:
- Smooth: blend everything together with a stick blender or in a jug blender until silky.
- Rustic: mash everything together with a fork or potato masher, keeping some texture.
- Chunky: simply stir everything together and leave the tomatoes largely intact.
- Taste and adjust the seasoning. The sauce should be rich, sweet, and full of flavour, if it tastes flat, it likely needs more salt or a squeeze of lemon juice.
Tips
- This sauce keeps in the fridge for up to five days in a sealed container. It also freezes very well, portion it into bags or containers and freeze for up to three months.
- Toss through pasta with a splash of the pasta cooking water, which helps the sauce cling. Spread onto pizza dough as a base. Use as the base for shakshuka (eggs poached in tomato sauce). Serve alongside grilled fish or chicken.
- Cherry tomatoes work particularly well for this, they are naturally sweeter and caramelise beautifully. You can leave them whole rather than halving them.
- If you have a large harvest, scale the recipe up as much as your roasting tin allows and freeze the excess in portions. An afternoon making this sauce in bulk is one of the most useful things you can do with a tomato glut.
- A few sprigs of fresh thyme or rosemary added to the tin at the start add another layer of flavour that works especially well if the sauce is destined for pizza.