Ernest Borgnine’s Italian Pevronatta

(Makes 6 to 8 servings)

Ingredients

• 1 pound sweet Italian sausage
• 1 pound lean ground beef
• 10 green bell peppers, diced
• 1 package (12 ounces) mushrooms, sliced
• 1 onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 ½ jars (32 ounce size) spaghetti sauce with mushrooms
• 1 tablespoon chopped parsley
• 1 cup red wine
• Cooked pasta
• Salt & pepper

Directions

1. In a large pan or Dutch oven, cook sausage and ground sirloin over high heat until well browned.
2. When meat is cooked, add peppers, mushrooms, onion, and garlic.
3. Cook until vegetables are tender.
4. Stir in spaghetti sauce, parsley, salt, and pepper.
5. Stir wine into spaghetti sauce and heat to boiling over high heat.
6. Reduce heat to low; cover partially and simmer 20 to 25 minutes, or until thickened.
7. Skim off and discard fat.
8. Serve with pasta.

Forever-Fit Garden-Fresh Roasted Marinara Sauce

Ingredients

• 3 pounds of fresh Roma tomatoes (or your favorite garden variety), washed and cored
• Nonstick cooking spray
• 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 medium to large sweet onion such as Vidalia, finely chopped
• 2 to 4 cloves garlic, chopped
• ¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
• ¼ cup fresh oregano or 2 teaspoons dried
• ¼ to ½ cup fresh basil or 2 to 3 teaspoons dried
• ½ cup filtered water
• Course salt and pepper to taste
• ½ to 1 teaspoon granulated sugar if desired*

Directions

The flavor and texture of tomato sauce tends to be deeply personal, so this recipe leaves room for your own adaptions and variations based on your taste preferences. If you like more garlic—add more. Feel like thyme would be good? Go for it! Cooking is about experimentation and fun. Enjoy by sharing the experience with your loved ones, and cook with children whenever possible!

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. With a sharp knife, halve tomatoes lengthwise. Divide tomatoes between two foil-lined baking sheets coated with nonstick cooking spray. Arrange in single layer, cut side up. Brush or drizzle 1 tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil over tomatoes. Season with salt and pepper. Roast 1 to 1½ hours (oven cooking times can vary).



3. Remove pans from oven. Allow to cool for 15 to 20 minutes. Spoon tomatoes into food mill** set over large mixing bowl, and pass tomatoes through food mill using medium texture blade to puree. If smoother texture is desired, run through food mill a second time.



4. Heat ¼ cup oil in saucepan over medium-high heat. Add onion, garlic, oregano, and basil. Saute for 5 to 8 minutes or until onion is translucent and tender. Add tomato puree and water or chicken broth. Bring to a boil, stirring to blend. Reduce heat to medium-low. Allow sauce to simmer, stirring frequently, until sauce has reached desired thickness (about 3 to 5 minutes). Season with salt and pepper to taste.

*If you find the taste to be too acidic or bitter (this can differ depending on type or freshness of tomato), adding a small amount of sugar can balance the acidity.
**If you don’t have a food mill, puree the tomatoes in a blender or food processor and strain through a sieve. If you don’t mind the unobtrusive seeds, you can skip the sieve entirely.

Mom’s Sauce

(Makes 10 servings)

Ingredients



Before his father’s parents would bless their marriage, food writer John Mariani’s grandmother demanded that his mom learn how to make Sunday gravy.

• 2/3 cup olive oil
• 3 large onions, chopped
• 2 large carrots, chopped
• 1 celery stick, chopped
• 6 garlic cloves, chopped
• 4 teaspoons salt (optional)
• 1 ½ teaspoons freshly ground pepper
• 3 bay leaves
• 2 teaspoons oregano
• 1 cup water
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 3 28-ounce cans Italian whole tomatoes, crushed or coarsely chopped
• 1 6-ounce can tomato paste

Directions
1. In large stockpot, heat olive oil. When hot, add onions, carrots, and celery. Sauté on medium heat for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally until lightly browned. Push vegetables to the side and add garlic. Season vegetables with some of the salt (optional) and pepper and cook for another 2 minutes.

2. Add bay leaves, oregano, water, sugar, tomatoes, and tomato paste to stockpot. Mix well and bring to boil. Season with rest of the salt (optional) and pepper. Reduce heat to low or medium-low and let cook for 45 minutes. Adjust seasonings. Sauce improves if made day before.

Nutrition Facts


Nutrition Facts
Per serving of Sauce
Calories: 241
Total Fat: 17 g (Sat. Fat: 2 g)
Sodium: 50 mg*
Carbohydrates: 22 g
Fiber: 5 g
Protein: 4 g
Diabetic Exchanges: 1.5 carbohydrate

*If you leave out optional salt and use no-salt-added canned tomatoes.



Tip: This sauce may be used in making lasagna or served with pasta of your choice. For Sunday gravy, add meats to sauce before serving. The end game is serving a sauce heaped with a variety of meats—take your pick. Meats that need tenderizing benefit from hours cooked in Sunday gravy, and they impart a wonderful meaty flavor. If adding meatballs, however, draw off some sauce and add meat-balls to it. Simmer them in the gravy, then add back to the main sauce.

Frankies Spuntino Tomato Sauce

Ingredients
• 1 cup olive oil
• 13 cloves garlic
• One 96-ounce can (1 kg.) or four 28-ounce cans Italian tomatoes
• Large pinch red pepper flakes
• 2 teaspoons fine sea salt

Directions

1. Combine olive oil and garlic in large deep saucepan and cook over medium-low heat for about 10 minutes, stirring or swirling occasionally, until garlic is deeply colored—striations of deep brown running through golden cloves—and fragrant. If garlic starts to smell acrid or sharp or is taking on color quickly, pull pan off stove and reduce heat.

2. While garlic is getting golden, deal with tomatoes: Pour them into bowl and crush them with your hands. We like to pull out the firmer stem end from each of the tomatoes as we crush them and discard those along with the basil leaves that are packed into the can.

3. When garlic is just about done, add red pepper flakes to the oil and cook them for 30 seconds or a minute, to infuse their flavor and spice into the oil. Dump in the tomatoes, add the salt, and stir well. Turn the heat up to medium, get the sauce simmering at a gentle pace, not aggressively, and simmer for 4 hours. Stir it from time to time. Mother it a little bit.

4. Check the sauce for salt at the end. The sauce can be cooked with meat at this point, or stored, covered, in the fridge for at least 4 days or frozen for up to a few months.

Meatballs

Ingredients
• 4 slices bread (2 packed cups’ worth)
• 2 pounds ground beef
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• ¼ cup finely chopped flat-leaf parsley
• ¼ cup grated Pecorino Romano, plus about 1 cup for serving
• ¼ cup raisins
• ¼ cup pine nuts
• 1½ teaspoons fine sea salt
• 15 turns white pepper
• 4 large eggs
• ½ cup dried bread crumbs
• Frankies Spuntino Tomato Sauce (from above)

Directions

1. Heat oven to 325°F. Put fresh bread in bowl, cover it with water, and let it soak for a minute or so. Pour off water and wring out bread, then crumble and tear it into tiny pieces.

2. Combine bread with remaining ingredients except tomato sauce in medium mixing bowl, adding them in the order listed. Add dried breadcrumbs last to adjust for wetness: mixture should be moist wet, not sloppy wet.

3. Shape meat mixture into handball-sized meatballs and space them evenly on baking sheet. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes. Meatballs will be firm but still juicy and gently yielding when they’re cooked through. (At this point, you can cool meatballs and hold them in refrigerator for as long as a couple of days or freeze them for future.)

4. Meanwhile, heat tomato sauce in sauté pan large enough to accommodate the meatballs comfortably.

5. Dump meatballs into pan of sauce and nudge heat up ever so slightly. Simmer meatballs for half an hour or so (this isn’t one of those cases where longer is better) so they can soak up some sauce. Keep them there until it’s time to eat.

Pork Braciola Marinara

Ingredients:
• Six ½-inch-thick boneless pork shoulder steaks (8 ounces each)
• Fine sea salt and freshly ground white pepper
• 1 clove, garlic, minced
• ⅔ cup chopped flat-leaf parsley
• 1 cup grated aged provolone
• 1 cup freshly grated Parmesan, plus more for serving
• Frankies Spuntino Tomato Sauce

Directions

1. Butterfly pork: With palm of one hand firmly steadying a cutlet on cutting board, and with your knife blade parallel to meat, slice almost all way through meat, leaving last ¼-inch uncut.

2. Open up cutlet like a book, season it with salt and white pepper, and set it aside. Repeat with remaining pieces of pork.

3. Sprinkle cut side of one cutlet with a tiny pinch of minced garlic, a couple of pinches of parsley, and a generous tablespoon of each cheese.

4. Roll cutlet into tight log and set aside, seam side down.

5. Tie braciola. The simplest way is to use 2 or 3 short lengths of butcher’s twine for each roll and tie them around meat to hold it together. If you’re a master of more professional ways of tying—like a real butcher’s tie—go for it. But the braciola doesn’t (or shouldn’t) get roughed up too much during the cooking process, so it doesn’t need to be in a straitjacket or anything.

6. Bring tomato sauce to a steady, gentle simmer in large pot.

7. Nestle braciola into pot of tomato sauce. Simmer for 3 hours, or until tender; you should be able to easily pull away a strand or two of meat with tug of fork.

8. To serve, remove braciola from sauce and snip off the twine. Arrange, whole or sliced, on a platter with generous blanket of sauce. Transfer remaining sauce to serving bowl. Serve hot or at room temperature. Garnish with grated Pecorino Romano and serve. Use leftover tomato sauce from the braciola in any recipe that calls for tomato sauce.