Sauce said 15 minutes but mine took hours - why

[legend_018]

ok please give me any insights if you have them- I doubled the amount of tomatoes, but this wonderful!!! recipe said 15 minutes and it took hours for my liquid to reduce and get thicker. Can someone please look this over. I used a big dutch oven pot on the top of my stove and kept it on simmer the whole time - after letting it come to a boil. My tomatoes were VERY juicy and produced a lot of liquid.

I did write to the author - however it was posted in 2008 and not sure if she is responding to posts that old. If anyone happens to have any insight. I really like this recipe and how she separates the pulp from the juice at the beginning stages and only concentrating on reducing/thickening the juices so the pulp doesn't cook a long time and lose some of it's flavor.

15-Minute Tomato Sauce. Really.: chez pim

M

 

[Selkie]

First of all, you can't double a recipe like this and expect it to cook in the same amount of time that the recipe calls for!

Second, I had to re-read part of the preparation several times just to assure myself of what was happening after the skin and crown had been removed. It says, "Squeeze the tomatoes into the sink to release excess juice and push out the seeds."

There goes a lot of the watery liquid down the drain. (I would save it, strain it and refrigerate it for later use... but in any case, it's not used in this recipe.) Did you do that? The liquid for the sauce comes from cooking down the remaining crushed tomato pulp, which wouldn't be a large amount of liquid, as it shows in the photographs.

I suspect you used the juices squeezed from the tomatoes in the first process done at the sink rather than letting the heat sweat the juice from the pulp as it cooks down.

 

[legend_018]

First of all, you can't double a recipe like this and expect it to cook in the same amount of time that the recipe calls for!

Second, I had to re-read part of the preparation several times just to assure myself of what was happening after the skin and crown had been removed. It says, "Squeeze the tomatoes into the sink to release excess juice and push out the seeds."

There goes a lot of the watery liquid down the drain. (I would save it, strain it and refrigerate it for later use... but in any case, it's not used in this recipe.) Did you do that? The liquid for the sauce comes from cooking down the remaining crushed tomato pulp, which wouldn't be a large amount of liquid, as it shows in the photographs.

I suspect you used the juices squeezed from the tomatoes in the first process done at the sink rather than letting the heat sweat the juice from the pulp as it cooks down.

I didn't squeeze any tomatoes into the sink. My eyes must of skipped over that step. after peeling the skins and taking core off - I squeezed all tomatoes into a bowl, poured the ENTIRE bowl into my dutch oven on top of the stove and let cook a little. I than used a strainer and tried to separate the pulp from the juices the BEST I could. I left the pulp to the side and cooked the juices only on the stove working toward reduction and thickening. Which took many hours - not 15 minutes.

I know it did state that after cooking a little - she "fished out the meaty pulp with a slotted spoon, then let the juices cook down"

 

[Andy M.]

How did it taste? Was it worth doing?

 

[legend_018]

How did it taste? Was it worth doing?

I thought it was good. Kind of neat when you put the pulp back in and add appropriate spices - how it turns into this nice chunky tomatoe sauce. I'm used to making the smooth sauces. I did do ONE thing different and cooked up an chopped onion in some oil prior to squeezing the tomatoes into the pan at the very beginning.

I mixed it with some cooked hamburger, chopped squash and zucchini, green peppers, and some spices and made zucchini and squash boats. basically filling, poured into zucchinni and squash shells and baked in oven. It turned out to be a very yummy dish and I know a lot of the good flavor came from the sauce I made.

I was just confused by the fact that it took me many hours to reduce the liquid and get it thicker - vs. the 15 minutes the blog says it will take.

 

[Andy M.]

I'd bet most cannot get this sauce done in 15 minutes. I think I'd rather take a little more time with my sauce.

 

[legend_018]

I'd bet most cannot get this sauce done in 15 minutes. I think I'd rather take a little more time with my sauce.

Well since I completely missed this step as Selkie noticed, I'm guessing that had a lot to do with it, since I did have a fair amount of juices in my pot.

I didn't do this step/sort of skipped over it...."Squeeze the tomatoes into the sink to release excess juice and push out the seeds."

 

[Andy M.]

Well since I completely missed this step as Selkie noticed, I'm guessing that had a lot to do with it, since I did have a fair amount of juices in my pot.

I didn't do this step/sort of skipped over it...."Squeeze the tomatoes into the sink to release excess juice and push out the seeds."

Yes, but I think the blogger glossed over a lot of the time consuming aspects of the process, such as getting a large pot of water hot, blanching tomatoes, cooling tomatoes, peeling tomatoes, heating a pan, sautéing oil and garlic, heating up the tomatoes...