Slow Roasted

A couple days ago my mother-in-law made a big batch of spaghetti sauce with her remaining garden tomatoes. I had several pounds of ripe big beef, cherry and roma tomatoes in my basement waiting to be used.

This afternoon I decided to roast all of my ripe tomatoes along with minced garlic, quartered onions, baby carrots and celery, drizzled with 4 tbsp olive oil to create a huge pot of spaghetti sauce. I roasted the veggies on baking sheets covered with parchment in a 250º oven for two hours. I would usually add sweet potatoes or squash to the roasting veggies, but we didn’t have any. So, instead I added 1 pkg of frozen butternut squash puree to the tomatoes once they were done roasting.

I plan to serve the sauce over chicken and grass fed beef meatballs and brown rice noodles for supper tonight. Then I will freeze the leftovers for use later this winter.

Homemade spaghetti sauce is not only an inexpensive way to preserve the fall harvest, it also makes a great quick-start ingredient for busy weeknights. I love that I can grab a vacuum sealed bag of spaghetti sauce from the freezer, place it in the sink with cold water and in 15 minutes it is thawed and ready to top a bowl of noodles, layer into a lasagna or stir into roasted spaghetti squash. And it is so much tastier than overpriced, bland, high sodium jarred spaghetti sauce.

I absolutely love slow roasted foods… sweet potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, peppers, squash, grass-fed beef, turkey breast. I like to roast up a big batch of veggies on Sunday afternoons for Matthew, Allan and I to enjoy all week with our lunches and snacks.

Matthew adores roasted sweet potatoes and carrots!

Roasted Veggie Spaghetti Sauce
Slow roasted vegetables give this sauce a sweet and slightly nutty flavor. This sauce is the perfect topping for brown rice noodles or layered into a lasagna.

Print this recipe.

Makes at least 3 meals worth of sauce

5 lbs very ripe tomatoes, cored and cut in half
3-4 cloves garlic
2 peeled and quartered onions
2 cups organic baby carrots or 3 organic carrots, scrubbed and chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
2 sweet potatoes, chopped
4 tbsp organic cold pressed extra virgin olive oil
1/2 tbsp italian seasoning

Preheat oven to 250º. Spray two baking sheet with olive oil.

Place the tomatoes cut side down on the baking sheet. Layer the remaining vegetables on top of the tomatoes and drizzle with extra virgin olive oil.

Cover with a sheet of parchment paper and roast for 2 hours.

Remove pans for oven, uncover and allow to cool for 10 minutes. If desired, remove skins from tomatoes.

Pour roasted vegetables into an 8-qt dutch oven add italian seasoning. Stir and bring to a boil over medium high heat. Turn heat to low and simmer at least 20 minutes, but up to three hours. Allow to cool. Puree using a blender or food processor. Working in batches, as necessary. Be very careful not to burn yourself.

Adjust seasonings to taste. Serve over noodles, spaghetti squash, chicken or layered into a lasagna.

Freeze leftovers for later use.