Tomato Sauce with Onion and Butter

Meet the easiest tomato sauce you'll ever make, and dare I say one of the best. All the ingredients are in the name, there's no chopping or dicing, and after 45 minutes you have an amazing, rich, almost creamy tomato sauce. I actually can't believe it's taken me so long to share this. I found this sauce maybe three months ago, and it makes frequent appearances. There's really not much else to say, except that you must try this...and soon. Buon appetito!

Tomato Sauce with Onion and Butter

Seen on Amateur Gourmet, originally from Marcela Hazan's Essentials of Italian Cooking

Ingredients

1 28oz can whole peeled tomatoes*

5 tablespoons unsalted butter

1 medium-sized yellow onion cut in half ("hamburger style"..hah!)

Salt to taste

Directions

Put the tomatoes (including the liquid from the can!), onion, and butter in a heavy saucepan over medium heat. Bring the sauce to a simmer then lower the heat to keep the sauce at a slow steady simmer (uncovered..reducing is key!) for about 45 minutes, or until droplets of fat float free of the tomatoes. Stir occasionally, crushing the tomatoes against the side of the pot with a wooden spoon. Remove from heat, and discard the onion. I used tongs, and gave them a good squeeze to get all the amazing onion juices back in the pot. Add salt to taste. You may find that your tomatoes already have salt added, in which case you might not need any salt. 

Serve with Spaghetti, with Parmesan cheese. Though, it's so good, you may find you don't even need it!

*I'm sure you could also used canned diced tomatoes or even tomato puree. The cooking time would probably be less, especially with the puree.