11 hours ago
The Genius Tomato Sauce Upgrade Italians Have Always Known About
There's a better tomato sauce—and it's been hiding in plain sight.
Passata, Italy's go-to smooth tomato purée, has slowly but steadily made its way into mainstream American grocery stores over the past several years, no longer the exclusive domain of Italian delis and specialty importers. This shift is largely due to increased distribution from major brands like Mutti and Cento.
That said, it's still often lamentably relegated to the bottom shelf of the canned vegetable aisle, hidden beneath jars of premade pasta sauces—overlooked, underused, and misunderstood. But passata deserves top billing, and it's time to make the most of it.
Sometimes labeled tomato purée or tomato sauce, passata is traditionally made with late summer, peak-season tomatoes, as a way to preserve them. It's a smooth, strained purée, free of skins and seeds, and typically sold in tall glass bottles.
Made from ripe, high-quality tomatoes, it's left unseasoned aside from a touch of salt and, occasionally, a few basil leaves. Its natural sweetness and acidity are already beautifully balanced, so it doesn't need much doctoring. Homemade passata is a wonderful thing if you have time and ripe tomatoes, but with excellent store-bought options available now in the US, it's not essential to start from scratch.
Unlike American-style store-bought tomato purées which are cooked until they have a thicker, more concentrated consistency and have a stewed-tomato flavor, passata is brighter, lighter, and far more reminiscent of fresh tomatoes.
It also stands apart from jarred sauces. While jarred options often come loaded with garlic, herbs, sugar, and emulsifiers or stabilizers, passata is a blank canvas—ready to soak up whatever flavors you throw at it. But it's also vibrant enough to be prepared simply, with just a few pantry staples.
And while I think passata outshines canned sauce in flavor, both are equally convenient for getting dinner on the table quickly. Only one, though, is nonna-approved.
Before it became widely available, at Serious Eats, we'd often recommend puréeing canned whole tomatoes for smooth sauces. That still works—but passata skips the blender, the strainer, and most importantly, the cleanup.
Passata is my weeknight workhorse. I keep two bottles on hand at all times. On nights when I don't want to think too hard, I heat olive oil with a heaping pile of sliced garlic, pour in the passata, season with chili flakes, and let it simmer just long enough for the flavors to come together—it takes less than 20 minutes. I toss it with whatever pasta I have, finish with a generous dollop of ricotta or a mound of grated Parmesan, drizzle on more olive oil, crack some black pepper over the top, and scatter torn basil if I have it on hand.
It's also the base for classics like pasta with spicy 'nduja-tomato sauce and pasta alla zozzona (rigatoni with sausage, guanciale, and egg yolks). Basically, whenever a smooth sauce is desired, passata is a great go-to.
As I noted above, passata is far from new—it's a staple in most Italian kitchens. But as it became more accessible in the US, it quickly became one of my indispensable pantry staples. Cento and Mutti are solid, widely available picks, but there are plenty of other great options out there—just check the label to make sure it lists nothing more than tomatoes, salt, and occasionally basil. It's the one tomato product that carries me from winter through spring and early summer, holding me over until August tomatoes finally arrive.
So if you see a tall bottle of passata on your next grocery run, grab it. Then grab two more.
Read the original article on Serious Eats
