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Originally Posted by dimbulb
Apparently the ingredients are the key. I've read that using the San Marzano canned plum tomatoes from Italy as she recommends is the key to a great tomato sauce. I can't really justify using tomatoes that cost twice as much as usual though, so I just stick with the Wegmans store brand, which gives me decent to good pasta.
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I agree that the tomatoes are important, but it's not really the brand or the region or the variety of tomatoes at issue. What you want are tinned tomatoes with nothing added. Crap like citric acid & calcium chloride keep the tomatoes from breaking down as you cook and make for suboptimal sauces. So there: a picky detail that's not in Marcella's book.
There is no decent butter in the US. All of it is flavoured, even the organic, "natural" butter. It doesn't bother me that much because i'm not much of a butter fan to begin with, but the flavouring apparently fucks up some sauces. My mother had trouble getting some candies to come out right and after much consultation with the people at Organic Valley, blamed the "natural flavouring." There is some amazing butter in Italy. And yes, it does not pay to skimp on the Parmesan. Some Wisconsin & Argentinian Parmesan-knock-offs are decent cheeses on their own, but they do not function as Parmesan substitutes.
Cooking with Marcella is a matter of submission. I guess she takes the logic of the cookbook & the recipe to their logical extremes.