Sauce recipe contest!

[ihavezippers]

The crust recipes I have found on this board are fantastic...however, I have not had the same luck with the sauce recipes.
However, I'm sure some of the "elders" of the forum have some very tasty sauces...after all, if you've accomplished the Herculean-task of creating a perfect crust, I doubt you have succombed to the lesser foe of creating a great sauce.

I'm calling you out, sauce gurus.  Please post your recipes.  From my readings, it seems like I probably need to have some of these exotic brands of canned tomatoes instead of Hunts or the other grocery store brands.  If you feel passionately that this is true, please give your reasoning.  Otherwise, even though I'm sure the better tomato products make a difference, I bet you can still make a mean sauce with even Hunts or some other regularly available tomato product.

The prize for winning?  The members of this forum's gratitude?  Well, if enough post, you will have some other good recipes to try out...and if we decide in the end that one recipe is superior to all, you will become a living legend.

[Pete-zza]

ihavezippers,

Can you tell us which of the forum sauce recipes you tried?

Peter

[scott r]

There is no recipe for what may be the best sauce I have ever had.  It's all a matter of having the right tomatoes.  If they are right, you don't have to do anything but maybe add some salt.  Take a trip to Naples and you will see what I mean.

As far as we go here in the states, there are so many types and opinions on the best pizza sauces that I could never even guess how to start helping you hone in on the type of sauce you would what to make.

Do you like chunks or smooth, or a combination?  I love to layer textures to create my favorite sauces.

Do you like a sweet sauce?  The natural sugar of a really good tomato can vary so much from brand to brand.  If you like a sweet sauce, sugar can never do what a sweet tomato can.

Do you like a very fresh tasting sauce, or a deeper richer one with complex flavor?  Not cooking your sauce with the right canned tomatoes can almost taste like a fresh sauce, where a cooked sauce will always have a different "less fresh" but sometimes preferable flavor.  Understand the various processing that is done to tomatoes even before you open the can, and realize that the whole tomatoes or tomato strips and a thinner packing juice will give you the freshest taste.  A thick paste, or a crushed tomato will give a deeper flavor.

Do you like a pure tomato flavor, or one that has lots of herbs, garlic, onion, or spices? Fresh herbs and a hint of garlic really can make a huge difference.

Do you want your pizza to be really light on the stomach? Olive oil or even a dash of cream can really kick up the flavor at the expense of feeling heavy.


There are so many excellent tips for sauce here on the forum.

Check out the Sicilian thread for a great cooked sauce.

Les' sweet sauce has to be amazing.

Everybody seems to like Jeff V's sauce.

You can't go wrong starting with an Uglyripe.



If you are unhappy with your sauce, I would venture to guess that you have not found the right tomatoes yet.  I have found that most people favor a very simple sauce made with the best tomatoes.  The less is more theory comes to mind here.  I think the most important thing is getting the hydration and texture right, and from there the rest is so personal.

[Perk]

My Italian side of family always used make their own sauce, My grandfather would always love to make sauce, He taught  my mother and her sisters, then me.  My grandpa was proud of his speggetti sauce! The whole family was proud!

My Grandfather is still kicking and he now uses Jar Sauce!!
I asked Grandpa what the heck are you doing?? Jesus an Italian making sauce from a Jar?
Just like those old comercials!! Funny stuff!

He said Jar sauce is the best for your base. Why struggle, get a Jar sauce that you like and add the little extra things.
Because it is in there!

It's cheeper and it taste better then I could make myself.

That  is a quote from a old Italian man.

food for thought.

[ihavezippers]

I am looking for an American (e.g., Papa Johns/Pizza Hut) styled sauce; I should have made that point more clear in the initial posting.

I have tried two sauces from the forum, and another from the homepage's recipe category.  The homepage recipe category sauce was the one featured in the top-rated Chicago pizza recipe...I believe it is DKM's recipe?  Whosever it is, it is the first recipe listed under the Chicago-styled category.  I used this sauce recipe the first couple attempts at making a pizza back in the fall/late summer; it wasn't what I was going for, but neither was my crust or my cheese.  I started using canned sauce(Ragu pizza sauce, which is actually pretty tasty) until two weeks ago as I wanted to systematically fix my pizza, crust first. The other two recipes I've tried come from the American subcategory...the first one was the Little Caesar's sauce recipe.  It was the best sauce recipe I've tasted from the board, but it was still far too sweet for me or my wife's taste...infact, we both felt a little sick from it...I woke up in a cold sweat the night after and almost called in sick the next day.  This past weekend I tried the Papa Johns sauce recipe, found under the Papa John's Dough Recipe thread.  It was very bland, but was similar in texture to what I like(it was fairly thick)...but honestly, it didn't taste a whole lot different after adding the spices than when I opened the can of the puree.

If you've had success with sauce recipes on this forum, please post a link.  I also had explored the Ingredients subforum, but only saw threads on the different types of tomatoes you can use.

I wanted to avoid the other subforums, b/c as I told Peter, I want to avoid weird sauces.  Living in the Bay Area for three years, I have had the misfortune of eating some strange pizzas.  Really what I am going for is that commercial taste...Papa Johns is probably the best consistent pizza sauce I've had, although I'm sure I've had better sauces at random small pizza places.  I am not really interested in a sauce where there are chunks of tomato left un-mutalized...I don't want to even know there are tomatoes in the sauce.

I don't know if that helps, but I'm willing to try anything.  Thanks to this site, my crust has gone from so disgusting that my dog won't eat it as leftovers to becoming the thing my wife and I eat away first.  If I can get the sauce right, I'll be in heaven.  Thanks for your help.

[ihavezippers]

Perk, that might be the best option given I am really going for that processed, commercialized taste anyways.
I am fairly happy with the Ragu sauce, which I can get fairly cheaply.  It needs only a dash of a few spices to really make it good.

I guess it is my ego that won't let go...I want to be able to say I made the pizza entirely from scratch.  I have a family of amateur cooks, and my wife has been passed down generations of traditional Sichuan cooking technique.  Meanwhile, I struggle to make my own pizza. 

I am not quite ready to throw in the towel, but at the moment, the jar sauce is the best I can do.

[scott r]

Since you are in the Bay area you have access to the right tomatoes to do an excellent, better than Papa John's/pizza hut style sauce.  If you want to go right for the best of the best call around to Italian Specialty stores in your area for Escalon or Stanislaus brand tomatoes.  I found them at a store out there called Genoa, but I know there are other places in the Bay Area you can find them.  They will probably not be in normal grocery stores.

Both of these producers make so many different products that I can't really give you the right processing steps until I know which products you have found.  Let me know what you find, and I can help.

[Pete-zza]

ihavezippers,

From what I have read at the PMQ.com Think Tank, Papa John's uses either or both of Escalon and Stanislaus products. You might find the following recipe for a "clone" of the PJ sauce helpful: http://www.pmq.com/cgi-bin/tt/index.cgi/noframes/read/2525. I would start with either the Escalon or Stanislaus tomatoes. You might also keep in mind that the Stanislaus tomatoes have citric acid added, whereas the Escalon products don't. Some people get heartburn or other side effects from citric acid.

Peter

[ihavezippers]

Since you are in the Bay area you have access to the right tomatoes to do an excellent, better than Papa John's/pizza hut style sauce.  If you want to go right for the best of the best call around to Italian Specialty stores in your area for Escalon or Stanislaus brand tomatoes.  I found them at a store out there called Genoa, but I know there are other places in the Bay Area you can find them.  They will probably not be in normal grocery stores.

Both of these producers make so many different products that I can't really give you the right processing steps until I know which products you have found.  Let me know what you find, and I can help.

I no longer reside in the Bay Area...(sigh).  I now live in rainy Seattle...but hey, we're going to the Superbowl, so we got something going I guess.

Thanks for the suggestions.  Peter, I will try this recipe this coming weekend (my Superbowl pizza)...I need to find a supplier of these tomatoes up here however.

[Lydia]

http://community-2.webtv.net/Hoo-Ha/JACKSMAMAMIAPIZZA/

I have search the web for good pizza dough/sauce recipes for over a decade, and dont mind sharing on this board. This recipe comes from a site that is no longer active but can be acessed though search engine cash or by the link above. If you have trouble with the link, let me know.

This is a good sauce designed for used with Hunt's, which I believe you mentioned Hunt's in an earlier post.
I suggest using Hunt's foodservice brand AngelaMia concentrated crushed tomatoes, if want more commercial pizzeria taste.

Warning: over-heating any sauce will produce bitter results.

Of couse using Escalon/Stanislaus products will give better flavor, but highly recomment this recipe if you wil be using Hunt's general grocery products.

Try-out the clone Peet recommended, if you can get the red-pack tomatoes.

[Pete-zza]

I have read that the Angela Mia tomatoes are/have been used by Domino's. One place that carries the Angela Mia tomatoes is here: http://www.foodservicedirect.com/index.cfm/S/32/CLID/415/N/84939/Hunts_Angela_Mia_Stewed_Tomatoes_.htm.

Peter

[Les]

The crust recipes I have found on this board are fantastic...however, I have not had the same luck with the sauce recipes.
However, I'm sure some of the "elders" of the forum have some very tasty sauces...after all, if you've accomplished the Herculean-task of creating a perfect crust, I doubt you have succombed to the lesser foe of creating a great sauce.

I'm calling you out, sauce gurus.  Please post your recipes.  From my readings, it seems like I probably need to have some of these exotic brands of canned tomatoes instead of Hunts or the other grocery store brands.  If you feel passionately that this is true, please give your reasoning.  Otherwise, even though I'm sure the better tomato products make a difference, I bet you can still make a mean sauce with even Hunts or some other regularly available tomato product.

The prize for winning?  The members of this forum's gratitude?  Well, if enough post, you will have some other good recipes to try out...and if we decide in the end that one recipe is superior to all, you will become a living legend.

I am loath to list my sauce as the best  , but since I think it is I can't help myself.   I was never satisfied with any sauce I tried, or had at a pizza place for that matter (and I lived in NYC for 18 months).  Sauces always (to my taste buds at least) seemed either slightly bitter/pasty, lacking sufficient tomato flavor, or altered somehow so that it didn't taste natural (as in adding sugar and cheese).  I tried unsucessfully for many years to create my dream sauce.

The only thing that seemed to get me close to what I wanted was vine-ripened fresh tomatoes (as in pizza Margherita) which, as you know, aren't always available.  Plus I needed more than just tomatoes when I made NY style, which is my favorite style of pizza.  What I wanted was something that had the tomato-flavor intensity of sauce, but somehow also had fresh tomato taste. 

As Lydia pointed out, cooking tomatoes can make them bitter, and citric acid does the same thing.  I personally find all canned tomatoes "flat" tasting.  My first clues came from here from people recommending Escalon brand.  They pack their 6 in 1 within hours after picking them vine-ripened, and they don't add citric acid.  Okay, but how do I avoid cooking?  In the area where I live "grape" tomatoes are available year 'round (off season:  Costco and Whole Foods), so I tried slow-baking them with a little oil and garlic.  Instead of getting bitter, to my great surprise the sugars condensed.  After pressing them through a food mill it created a very intense tomato flavor, naturally sweet base; I added the 6 in 1 ground tomatoes and fresh herbs to complete the sauce.  And then when it's time to make a pizza I add fresh chopped grape tomatoes.  Here's where you can find the technique:  http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,1931.0.html

Suggestion: if I win the best sauce award I think the prize should be a new XBox 360.  What do you think?

[ihavezippers]

I am loath to list my sauce as the best  , but since I think it is I can't help myself.   I was never satisfied with any sauce I tried, or had at a pizza place for that matter (and I lived in NYC for 18 months).  Sauces always (to my taste buds at least) seemed either slightly bitter/pasty, lacking sufficient tomato flavor, or altered somehow so that it didn't taste natural (as in adding sugar and cheese).  I tried unsucessfully for many years to create my dream sauce.

The only thing that seemed to get me close to what I wanted was vine-ripened fresh tomatoes (as in pizza Margherita) which, as you know, aren't always available.  Plus I needed more than just tomatoes when I made NY style, which is my favorite style of pizza.  What I wanted was something that had the tomato-flavor intensity of sauce, but somehow also had fresh tomato taste. 

As Lydia pointed out, cooking tomatoes can make them bitter, and citric acid does the same thing.  I personally find all canned tomatoes "flat" tasting.  My first clues came from here from people recommending Escalon brand.  They pack their 6 in 1 within hours after picking them vine-ripened, and they don't add citric acid.  Okay, but how do I avoid cooking?  In the area where I live "grape" tomatoes are available year 'round (off season:  Costco and Whole Foods), so I tried slow-baking them with a little oil and garlic.  Instead of getting bitter, to my great surprise the sugars condensed.  After pressing them through a food mill it created a very intense tomato flavor, naturally sweet base; I added the 6 in 1 ground tomatoes and fresh herbs to complete the sauce.  And then when it's time to make a pizza I add fresh chopped grape tomatoes.  Here's where you can find the technique:  http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,1931.0.html

Suggestion: if I win the best sauce award I think the prize should be a new XBox 360.  What do you think?

Heh...I will try your sauce first.  When I was getting my tires changed at Walmart last weekend, I had the misfortune of playing this hyped-Xbox360.  I really wasn't that impressed, although I was limited to the demo games they had.  I say you should wait for the Playstation 3...now thats a pizza pie!Thanks for the recipe.

[foodblogger]

I really like the way fresh tomatoes taste on a thin crust pizza.  There are a lot of ways to go about making sauce, and in the end it is a personal preference thing.  Some people are content to take a can of tomato sauce and spice it up a bit.  Other people, http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,1931.0.html make extremely involved sauces.  Mine is somewhere in between.

I start with fresh Roma tomatoes.  The DOC specifies that they have to be San Marzano, but unfortunately I don't live in Naples so I can't get fresh San Marzano tomatoes, only canned.  A couple years ago I grew a strain of tomato in my garden called Super San Marzano.  They were amazing.  I canned a bunch of them up but they are all gone now.  When I can't get vine ripened garden fresh tomatoes I settle on vine ripened store bought roma tomatoes.  If you can't get vine ripened, oh well, you'll just have to make do with regular plum/roma tomatoes.  Let them sit on the counter for a few days ripening.

To process my tomatoes I preheat the broiler.  I take the tomatoes and wash them and put them on a cookie sheet.  I then broil the tomatoes under the broiler for a few minutes, turning occasionally, so that the skin blackens a bit on all sides.  There are usually a few spots of skin that stay red.  After the tomatoes cool, I peel most of the blackened skin off, leaving a little behind.  Then I run the tomatoes through a food mill to grind them into a thick chunky sauce.

The next part of my sauce making involves a little tasting to get the flavor right.  If I used 4 plum tomatoes, I add a teaspoon of sea salt to the ground tomatoes along with 1 t freshly ground black pepper and 1 t very finely ground fennel seed.  After stirring for a while, you have to taste the sauce.  The flavor that you will be adjusting for will be the saltiness.  BE VERY CAREFUL.  You don't want the salt to be too overpowering.  Add just a little at a time.  4 plum tomatoes makes more than enough sauce for a 12 inch pizza.  You can serve the remainder as a dipping sauce for crusts.

[ihavezippers]

I really like the way fresh tomatoes taste on a thin crust pizza.  There are a lot of ways to go about making sauce, and in the end it is a personal preference thing.  Some people are content to take a can of tomato sauce and spice it up a bit.  Other people, http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,1931.0.html make extremely involved sauces.  Mine is somewhere in between.

I start with fresh Roma tomatoes.  The DOC specifies that they have to be San Marzano, but unfortunately I don't live in Naples so I can't get fresh San Marzano tomatoes, only canned.  A couple years ago I grew a strain of tomato in my garden called Super San Marzano.  They were amazing.  I canned a bunch of them up but they are all gone now.  When I can't get vine ripened garden fresh tomatoes I settle on vine ripened store bought roma tomatoes.  If you can't get vine ripened, oh well, you'll just have to make do with regular plum/roma tomatoes.  Let them sit on the counter for a few days ripening.

To process my tomatoes I preheat the broiler.  I take the tomatoes and wash them and put them on a cookie sheet.  I then broil the tomatoes under the broiler for a few minutes, turning occasionally, so that the skin blackens a bit on all sides.  There are usually a few spots of skin that stay red.  After the tomatoes cool, I peel most of the blackened skin off, leaving a little behind.  Then I run the tomatoes through a food mill to grind them into a thick chunky sauce.

The next part of my sauce making involves a little tasting to get the flavor right.  If I used 4 plum tomatoes, I add a teaspoon of sea salt to the ground tomatoes along with 1 t freshly ground black pepper and 1 t very finely ground fennel seed.  After stirring for a while, you have to taste the sauce.  The flavor that you will be adjusting for will be the saltiness.  BE VERY CAREFUL.  You don't want the salt to be too overpowering.  Add just a little at a time.  4 plum tomatoes makes more than enough sauce for a 12 inch pizza.  You can serve the remainder as a dipping sauce for crusts.

Makes me hungry to read.  I found a source for the AngelaMia tomatoes posted earlier, so I will probably try that out this weekend first.  I also want to try Peter's recommendation soon, as he has always been right on with the crust.  My wife limits me to one pizza per week, so it might be a few weeks, but I'll get to all the sauce recipes and report back my results.

[ihavezippers]

Do you think you could just use a spaghetti sauce for pizza sauce, or would it be too runny?
For instance, I've always really liked Prego spaghetti sauce...I think it is fairly close to what I would want in a pizza sauce...even the texture is almost there. 

[Hi Gluten]

Since moving to New Jersey, I've been growing my own tomatoes. The climate and soil seem to be very conducive. Even though I have or tried DOZENS of different tomato products, both consumer and professional; I've yet to get as good results from the fresh tomatoes!

This upcoming growing season will see even more plants. I may even give canning a try.

'Just can't get enough fresh tomatoes!

[Pete-zza]

ihavezippers,

I don't know if it will help, but not too long ago I got a list from Papa John's of Papa John's products and ingredients. This is what was given for the PJ pizza sauce:

Pizza Sauce: Vine-ripened fresh tomatoes, sunflower oil, sugar, salt, spices, garlic*, extra virgin olive oil and citric acid. *Dehydrated

The vine-ripened fresh tomatoes and citric acid leads me to believe that PJ's is using the Stanislaus tomatoes (because of the citric acid). In fact, if you go to the PJ website and look under pizza sauce, the description almost makes it certain that they are using Stanislaus. There's no one else but Escalon, possibly, that could meet PJ's tomatoes needs. The law doesn't require all of the spices to be identified so, for that, you are pretty much on your own. However, I think that it is safe to say that whatever spices they use will cater to middle of the road tastes and not include "exotic" or fancy (to most pizza eaters) ingredients. A good starting point on the herbs/spices might be a McCormick's Italian seasoning blend, or possibly Penzeys pizza seasoning. FYI, I have not been able to determine whether PJ's cooks their pizza sauces in any way. It would seem contrary to the notion of using the best and freshest ingredents.

I might add that PJ's website currently includes oregano as one of its pizza sauce ingredients, along with spices. I don't know if that means that the "spices" they use exclude herbs, or whether they are trying to put the spotlight on oregano for some reason. Most suppliers tend to distinguish between spices, herbs and seasonings/blends.

As far as using spaghetti sauces is concerned, that, again, is a matter of personal taste. Many spaghetti sauces can be on the watery side, so it may be necessary to drain them to thicken them a bit. Most supermarket brands have a lot of sugar (usually cheap corn syrup) so you might like the sweetness. Of the few brands of supermarket spaghetti sauces that I tried on pizzas--purely in the name of science, mind you--I thought the Classico brand was the best. It is not nearly as sweet as the others and, if memory serves me correct, many of their tomato-based sauces do not include corn syrup or similar sweeteners. The one that I liked best was the sundried tomato sauce. 

Peter

[ihavezippers]

ihavezippers,

I don't know if it will help, but not too long ago I got a list from Papa John's of Papa John's products and ingredients. This is what was given for the PJ pizza sauce:

Pizza Sauce: Vine-ripened fresh tomatoes, sunflower oil, sugar, salt, spices, garlic*, extra virgin olive oil and citric acid. *Dehydrated

The vine-ripened fresh tomatoes and citric acid leads me to believe that PJ's is using the Stanislaus tomatoes (because of the citric acid). In fact, if you go to the PJ website and look under pizza sauce, the description almost makes it certain that they are using Stanislaus. There's no one else but Escalon, possibly, that could meet PJ's tomatoes needs. The law doesn't require all of the spices to be identified so, for that, you are pretty much on your own. However, I think that it is safe to say that whatever spices they use will cater to middle of the road tastes and not include "exotic" or fancy (to most pizza eaters) ingredients. A good starting point on the herbs/spices might be a McCormick's Italian seasoning blend, or possibly Penzeys pizza seasoning. FYI, I have not been able to determine whether PJ's cooks their pizza sauces in any way. It would seem contrary to the notion of using the best and freshest ingredents.

I might add that PJ's website currently includes oregano as one of its pizza sauce ingredients, along with spices. I don't know if that means that the "spices" they use exclude herbs, or whether they are trying to put the spotlight on oregano for some reason. Most suppliers tend to distinguish between spices, herbs and seasonings/blends.

As far as using spaghetti sauces is concerned, that, again, is a matter of personal taste. Many spaghetti sauces can be on the watery side, so it may be necessary to drain them to thicken them a bit. Most supermarket brands have a lot of sugar (usually cheap corn syrup) so you might like the sweetness. Of the few brands of supermarket spaghetti sauces that I tried on pizzas--purely in the name of science, mind you--I thought the Classico brand was the best. It is not nearly as sweet as the others and, if memory serves me correct, many of their tomato-based sauces do not include corn syrup or similar sweeteners. The one that I liked best was the sundried tomato sauce. 

Peter

Peter, thanks.  I saw this ingredients listing before and was thinking about using it, using the proportions I have seen in other generic pizza sauce recipes.  What do you think the proportions are on the sunflower and olive oils?  It seems olive oil is a common element in every sauce recipe, whereas sunflower oil not so much...I am wondering if sunflower oil is present in only small part.
Also, I have seen the advocation of soybean oil over olive oil on this board many times before and am wondering what effect if any that would have.  Then again, if Papa Johns is using Olive Oil, I should use Olive Oil if I want that taste.

I guess the Stanislaus and Escalon tomatoes are only available through mail-order-direct?  Do you think a restaurant supply warehouse or a high-end grocer like Whole Foods or Trader Joe's would have them?

[Pete-zza]

ihavezippers,

Government regulations require that ingredients be listed in the order of their predominance, by weight. There was a statement with an asterisk at the top of the document I received from PJ stating that "Ingredients are not necessarily listed in order of predominance", but there was no asterisk next to the Pizza Sauce. So, I assume that the ingredients in the pizza sauce are ordered by predominance. On that basis, there would be more sunflower oil, by weight, than salt, sugar, and everything else specified in the ingredient list. There is no way of knowing the actual quantities. The government does not require that. You would have to experiment.

To replicate the sauce, you would want to use as many of the ingredients on the list as you can. That means sunflower oil and olive oil also. I wouldn't substitute soybean oil, only because I don't know what it will do in terms of flavor if it is one of the largest items by weight in the sauce.  Soybean oil is often used because it is less expensive than olive oil and other oils. In Italy, contrary to common opinion, pizza operators use seed oils instead of olive oil. They are mild flavored oils and cheaper than olive oil. In the U.S., olive oil is preferred over seed oils. The use of sunflower oil by PJ may be out of the norm.

The Escalon tomatoes can be ordered direct from Escalon, at escalon.net. The cans are standard 28-ounce cans. Stanislaus is harder to find in small cans. Both Escalon and Stanislaus are available by mail order from PennMac at pennmac.com (look under the Pizza Makers tab), or by calling PennMac directly and speaking with Rose, who is a member of the forum. However, I am fairly certain that the Stanislaus is available in only #10 cans at PennMac. If you look at the pizza ingredients sections of the forum or do a forum search, you will find other options I am sure. Some Kroger's carry the Escalon tomatoes, but I have not seen them in my area. I haven't seen them at Whole Foods or the Trader Joe's I have frequented either, but each store is different. The easiest way for the time being may be to order some 6-in-1s directly from Escalon. You can always try the Stanislaus later after you have identified a probable source. There are many distributors and foodservice companies that carry the Stanislaus brand, but it may take time to find one that will sell to you as an individual, and in small quantities, on a cash-and-carry basis.

Peter