Mom's Sunday Pasta Sauce

One of the memories I have of my mom is her sauce.  She cooked it all day and it was loaded with meat and tons of flavor.  She had a huge pot that was only used for sauce.  I was lucky that before she passed away she shared with me her recipe.  I use the term recipe loosely - it is a method.  I now have her sauce pot and whenever I use it,  I feel close to her and think of her in the kitchen stirring sauce in it.  I hope that you make this and create your own memories cooking it and sitting around the table enjoying it.

Ingredients:

2 TBS Olive Oil
2.5 lbs Sweet Italian Sausage (I bought mine at Whole Foods)
1 lb Hot Italian Sausage (I bought Nature's Promise from Stop and Shop)
2.25 pork shoulder country style ribs cut into 3 pieces (Mom prefered pork neck bones and ribs)
7 large cloves garlic, finely chopped
9 28 oz. Crushed Tomatoes with basil (I used Muir Glen organic)
   28 oz water (use the tomato can and swish the water in the cans to get the rest of the tomatoes out)
12 Basil leaves, chiffonade
1 TBS fresh chopped oregano
2 TBS kosher salt
1 tsp fresh ground black pepper

Here is how to do it:

Get youself a huge pot. There is a lot of stuff going in here so you need a deep pot.  Here is mine:

Add the olive oil to the pot and heat it on medium heat.  Once hot, brown the sausages in the bottom of the pan.  Do it in batches and do not crowd the pan.  You are looking to brown the meat not to cook it or steam it.  As the sausages are ready, take them out and place them in a bowl while you finish the rest.  Here is how they should look in the pan:

Sweet Sausage



Hot sausage

Browned and removed into a bowl


Now brown the pork ribs the same way.

Ribs cut into 3 pieces

Browned ribs

Once the ribs are browned all around, push the meat to the side of the pot and add the chopped garlic.  Cook for one minute.

Chopped garlic, add to pot

Add all the tomotoes and one can of water. 

Add basil, oregano, salt and pepper.

Basil, chiffonade

Chopped oregano

All herbs and seasonings added to pot

 Stir the pot to incorporate all the ingredients.  Turn heat on stove down to low to simmer the pan but not boil. Cover the pot but leave it off a little bit to let the water evaporate out.

While cooking. stir often and make sure to get all the way down to the bottom so it does not burn.  Cook the sauce for 3 hours until the sauce has thickened and the ribs will be falling apart.  If the fat from the meat starts to collect at the top of the pot, simply skim it off with a large spoon.  Once done, remove the meat and place into a bowl.  Scoop out the sauce into a bowl.  Serve your dinner.  You should get about 7 quarts of cooked sauce out of this.  I like to make this amount so that I have enough sauce for baked ziti, lasagne, chicken parmesan and any other dinner in the future.  It is worth your time.

Close up of cooked sauce

Ready to serve

Sausage and ribs

You may notice that I left out meatballs.  I find that if you throw meatballs in they fall apart.  I cook them in a pot next to the sauce pot.  I put 25 meatballs into a pot with 2 28 oz cans of crushed tomatoes and cook on low for 30 minutes.  This gets the meatballs full of tomato flavor without them falling apart.  Another option is to cook the sauce and then 30 minutes before it is ready, ladle some into a pot with the meatballs so they get the same flavors as the sauce.