Marcella Hazan’s tomato pasta sauce has been dubbed the ‘best in the world’ despite being made up of just three ingredients and being rather low-effort.
This pasta sauce, which was first published in Marcella’s 1992 recipe book The Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, can be made by simply just mixing some butter, half and onion, and a tin of chopped tomatoes.
Hearing that this is ‘the best in the world’ I just knew I had to give it a go, so heading out to the shop I only needed to pick up some tinned tomatoes, as I already had onions in.
And as I’m doing veganuary, and my partner went vegan towards the end of last year, instead of using butter I subbed this with the Flora that I had in my frige.
Prepping the ingredients was extremely low effort, with the first and only pre-cooking step being peeling the onion and then chopping it in half.
These ingredients then went straight into the pan and were left to simmer for 45 minutes. It was quite nice not to have to stand over the stovetop while my food cooked, and this did give me time to wash up and wipe down the kitchen sides.
However, after about 20 minutes of this, I realised that I actually quite like having other parts of a recipe to make while my food cooks, whether that’s creating a side salad or frying up some mushrooms.
At the half-hour mark, it was time to put the pasta on, and at this point, I gave the sauce a check, and it did look a bit more appetizing then when first placed in the pan, although still quite plain.
After 15 minutes the pasta sauce was finished cooking, and while some people who make this recipe opt to discard the onion after cooking, I decided to mix it into the sauce before plating.
Then it was time to dish up the pasta and sauce, and after tasting it I decided to add some black pepper and vegan parmesan just give it a bit more flavour.
And while this was certainly a nice pasta sauce, I don’t quite agree with Delish’s claims that it’s the ‘world’s best’, given that it’s not even the best pasta sauce that I’ve made – that was a creamy mushroom sauce, that I’ve been unable to find the recipe for since.
If I were to make Marcella’s pasta sauce again, I would certainly add some more ingredients, possibly mushrooms and spinach for a bit more flavour, and would perhaps be tempted to quarter the onion rather than halve it, just so there aren’t huge chunks of onion in my pasta.
If cooked with more ingredients, I also feel that this recipe perhaps wouldn’t take 45 minutes to cook, and I would be sitting down to dinner much quicker, even if I did have to put a bit more effort into making it.
Overall, it was a pleasant dish, but I felt slightly underwhelmed, given the claims that it would be the best in the world, and my partner, who had been sceptical of the claims from the beginning was inclined to agree.
Marcella Hazan’s pasta sauce
Ingredients
- A generous knob of butter
- Half an onion
- One can of tinned tomatoes
Method
Chop the onion in half and add to the pan alongside the butter and tomatoes, and leave to simmer for 45 minutes.
When this has finished cooking, either remove the onion or stir it into the sauce and serve alongside your choice of pasta.