Super Easy, Incredibly Delicious Spaghetti Sauce. How to Can and Preserve Tomato Sauce (Vegan Option included)

Are you looking for a super easy recipe that is rewarding to make, smells incredible and tastes delicious?

You’ve found it!

I am a huge fan of all Italian food, so having a good red sauce at my fingertips is a must!

This is a yummy recipe that always turns out amazing even with varying amounts and varying ingredients.

You just can’t go wrong with this one! It is a great meatless option or perfect for adding prepared meat to, or mushrooms and olives.

Growing up, we always made spaghetti sauce from scratch, as we prepared the meal, which was delicious of course, but could take a long time to prepare.

So when I was introduced to the following recipe, with the possibility of canning the sauce for convenient use over the year, I was really interested to try it!

It turned out to be extremely easy and straight forward and the convenience of opening a jar for pizza sauce, spaghetti sauce and lasagna, makes things so much more doable, when you are cooking for a large family.

I have used this recipe for over 12 years and we still love it on our spaghetti, fettuccine and in our lasagna. I use it for our homemade pizza as well.

I tweaked it in the first few years, but settled on a pretty consistent recipe after that.

I haven’t added the chicken broth for many years and so this can be a great vegan option as well, or for Catholics avoiding meat on Friday. This sauce it still delicious even without meat.

I mainly use our own tomatoes, garlic and onions (the one year, I had an abundance of bunching onions and green onions, so I used a lot of those in place of the standard onions and it came out just as nicely.)

Sometimes I leave out the peppers, or only use one color. Basically whatever we have coming out of the garden at the time I am making the sauce.

If you have fresh herbs to use, double the amount added.

I have loved using fresh basil and parsley when I have them.

They do not need to be chopped finely, since you send the sauce through a food processor before using it and the large chunks and herbs, get a good chopping in that.

The ingredients do not need to be organic, though most of what we grow is organic, so it ends up that way most of the time.

Fresh Roasted Tomato Sauce

10 pounds of fresh, Organic tomatoes, any kind will do, though a Roma or sauce type tomato is good.

16-20 whole, peeled, large, plump organic garlic cloves (watch how I peel large amounts of garlic with less effort here)

Red and Green Peppers roughly Chopped (optional)

½ cup extra virgin Olive Oil

½ cup Chicken Broth (optional)

6 Tablespoons fresh Oregano leaves or 3 Tablespoons of Dried Oregano

2 medium Onions, roughly chopped

1 Tablespoon kosher salt or Sea Salt

2 Teaspoons ground Black Pepper

2 Tablespoons each of dried Parsley, Basil and Paprika (I prefer Smoked Paprika)

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit.

Wash and quarter the tomatoes.

Peel the garlic, roughly chop the onions. Big chunks are good. The smaller the pieces are, the faster they will roast.

You want to give the tomatoes a good time to roast, so that the flavor is really good. So roasting it too fast, might not be ideal.

I’ve become less and less concerned about how the chunks are or whether they are uniform, size wise.

Sometimes, I throw whole tomatoes into the pot depending on the size of the tomato.

Place tomatoes in a large roasting pan, I like to use my turkey roaster for this, add all ingredients and toss them together.

Place pan in oven and roast, stirring occasionally, until tomatoes have reduced and are starting to get a few black edges.

The pan should still have juices and not be dry.

In my large roasting pan, the tomato amount ends up a little more than half the amount as they were when they were first put into the oven.

Depending on your oven it should take 45-60 minutes.

Stir half way through, or more often if you want. I think that I end up stirring at least three times.

Remove pan from the oven, and let cool until you can put the sauce into a food processor (Here’s the one I have, that works well) with a steel blade and pulse until it is chunky or smooth according to your preference.

You can also use an immersion blender (Also a great way to go, and cheaper, if you need to buy something to use) in a deep pot or bowl to minimize splattering.

I have also refrigerated a batch overnight, then made a batch the following day and combined the two after pureeing. Two batches usually fill 7 quart jars for me.

This Roasted Tomato Spaghetti Sauce, can be used fresh or canned. One batch fills about 3 ½ Quart jars. To fill a full water bath canner or steam canner with 7 Quarts, two batches of sauce will fill those 7 jars for you.

If you are planning on canning your sauce, I love using the steam canning method, since it takes less time and fuel and is energy efficient.

It is not generally recommended in standard canning practice circles, but I have used the steam canning method for years and never had a problem with it.

It is a method that is widely accepted by a lot of people. If you are curious to know more about Steam Canning, here is an excellent post on that.

You, of course are encouraged to use a method that you are most comfortable with.

I was unable to find the exact Steam Canner that I own, but here is one that I would definitely consider if I needed to buy one. And here’s another option that looks good.

If you do use a Steam Canner, process quarts for 20 minutes. Otherwise, use a water bath canner for the same amount of time.

ENJOY!!!

Disclosure: Some of the links in this post are ‘affiliate links’. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission.