How to thicken up pasta/marinara sauce

[Janet H]

I have thickened sauce by pureeing some sun dried tomatoes in a little bit of the sauce and then mixing back into the pot. Side benefit is that intense flavor is added to runny sauce.

 

[larry_stewart]

I have thickened sauce by pureeing some sun dried tomatoes in a little bit of the sauce and then mixing back into the pot. Side benefit is that intense flavor is added to runny sauce.

I like that Idea
Ive made. sun-dried tomato pesto in the past , which has nothing to do with thickening sauce, but I remember it was really good, with that intense tomato flavor you are talking about. Thanks for reminding me about it

 

[Sir_Loin_of_Beef]

Some good thoughts here. As GotGarlic mentioned my aim here is to thicken ready to go glass jar sauce (i.e. Rao, Ragu, Classico, etc).

Sorry, I can't help you there. The last time I opened a jar of store bought sauce I got a phone call from the groundskeeper at St. Joseph's cemetery. It seems that my Sicilian grandmother tore up the landscaping rolling over in her grave and my mother kicked the door off her crypt. Sicilians get very emotional about their sauce.

 

[CraigC]

The only time we buy jarred tomato sauce is for our hurricane supplies. I had to thin last nights homemade sauce by adding more red wine.

 

[kenmiller]

I think corn flour will work well to thicken the sauce …… add corn flour and water mixture…

 

[Bama-Rick]

if you are using jar marinara sauce for spaghetti but it ends up being too runny here is a trick they use in restaurants.

when you drain the water off the noodle save about a 1/4 cup of the starchy water. put a cup or so of the marinara sauce in the pot you boiled the spaghetti noodles in. turn it on low while stirring the sauce and noodle mixture add the starchy water and a tablespoon of butter continue cooking until the sauce starts to stick to the noodles add a little pamazine cheese if you want. put it in your favorite serving bowl and dish it out to your guests and family.

basically you are making a gravy with and sauce, starch, and fat.

 

[GotGarlic]

We're repeating ourselves now I think the OP has his answer.

 

[bbqcoder]

No, no, no to thickening tomato sauce with corn starch!!

Can you comment why this is a bad idea? Maybe it depends on the sauce you are making. There is a sauce that I make from fresh tomatoes, rosemary, and heavy cream that I thicken with some corn starch and water slurry.

 

[taxlady]

Can you comment why this is a bad idea? Maybe it depends on the sauce you are making. There is a sauce that I make from fresh tomatoes, rosemary, and heavy cream that I thicken with some corn starch and water slurry.

Corn starch doesn't thicken properly in an acidic environment. The sauce you thickened with it had heavy cream, which would have changed the pH of the sauce so it wasn't acidic. I have never tried arrowroot in tomato sauce, but it does work in an acidic environment, but shouldn't be used with dairy. I have read that arrowroot makes a sauce with dairy slimy.

 

[GotGarlic]

Can you comment why this is a bad idea? Maybe it depends on the sauce you are making. There is a sauce that I make from fresh tomatoes, rosemary, and heavy cream that I thicken with some corn starch and water slurry.

The cornstarch dulls the tomato flavor, but so does dairy, so it doesn't matter in your case.