Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Sun-Dried Tomato Marinara


When Dan was at 105 degrees last week he loved the cannelloni which included a sun-dried tomato marinara. Of course the recipes I have seen all include at least a ¼ cup of olive oil. As those of you that know me are aware, that is simply is not going to happen at my house. I used a combination of two recipes to come up with this version. It worked fairly well, but next time I will add more sun-dried tomatoes and I will dehydrate the sauce for a couple of hours to concentrate the flavor. Here is the sauce I used tonight.

Sun-Dried Tomato Marinara
Makes approximately 33 tablespoons

Ingredients:

2 cups tomatoes, diced and strained of excess liquid
2 cloves garlic, smashed
½ inch fresh ginger, minced – optional but added a nice zip
1 tablespoon basil puree from the freezer
juice of ½ lime
½ Medjool date, pit removed
½ teaspoon oregano, dried
6 sun-dried tomatoes, roughly chopped
6 sun-dried tomatoes, finely diced

Directions:

Combine everything except the finely diced sun-dried tomatoes. Process the sauce in your blender until it is smooth. Pour the sauce into a jar and add the remaining finely diced sun-dried tomatoes and refrigerate until needed.

If you want to use the sauce warm place in a shallow dish and warm in your dehydrator while the pizza crush and mushrooms are “cooking”.  That is what I did tonight.

Nutritional Information (per tablespoon):

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 7.62
Calories From Fat (31%) - 2.39
Total Fat - 0.27g
Saturated Fat - 0.04g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 15.88mg
Potassium - 57.98mg
Total Carbohydrates - 1.31g
Fiber - 0.3g
Sugar -0.82g
Protein - 0.25g

Comments:

The flavor of this sauce was good, but I would like it to be more concentrated. Since I have leftover sauce I will try to concentrate the flavor by dehydrating it for a couple of hours tomorrow. I suspect that will make a big difference.

Tonight we had this on our raw pizza as well as in dehydrated Crimini mushrooms that were also topped with sun-dried tomato nut cheese I made earlier today.

Considering this was my first attempt at making raw marinara I am very pleased with the results. This was easier than I expected it to be. I can now see why I will be drying many more Roma tomatoes next year when they are in season.

4 comments:

  1. Interesting with the addition of the date. Just 1/2 of one? I'm assuming it was to add sweetness to offset the tang from tomatoes? I've been wanting to make a sundried tomato sauce, but have always worried I'd be too heavy-handed with the sundrieds! Thanks for sharing this one.

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  2. Heather,

    Both the recipes I looked at added a sweetener. I choose to change it to date, but just a little because I didn't want it to be obviously sweet. Sometimes you see sugar added to cooked sauce (although I don't), I assume it serves the same purpose. The proportion of sun-dried tomatoes was different in the two sauces. Mine is more in the middle. The sauce would also make a nice sandwich spread in place of ketchup.

    Alicia

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  3. Hi,
    I'm brand new to this blog and to trying to cook and eat vegan. I'm wondering about your aversion to olive oil. Can you tell me more as many of the recipes I've found in THE KIND DIET (Alicia Silverstone) use a lot of olive oil, and I'm gaining weight!! Thanks!

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  4. mbarbero,

    I avoid oil because it is nothing but fat unlike nuts or seeds which also contain fiber. A vegan diet is not necessarily healthy, in fact most vegans eat a diet just as unhealthy as omni Americans. I consider oil a processed food as well as a concentrated source of calories that is unnecessary. We do still eat nuts, seeds and avocado but not in large quantities. I will try to right a post about oil with more details soon. Sorry to hear you are gaining weight on The Kind Diet. But it sounds like you know why so you can modify it so that it works for you.

    Ali

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