Smoked tomato sauce, Alison’s recipe_ Matt Burgess, Chef

In my younger years my close friends mother who I fondly called “second mum” Alison, made a tomato sauce / relish. 

In the late summer I remember her heading “up the line” (driving to the Levin’s tomato farms) picking her own boxes of tomatoes to be made into soup, chutneys and her infamous “tomato sauce.

It tasted sweet, smoky, sour kind of like burnt tomatoes. 

It blew my mind. 

I begged her for bottles daily, she gave up in the end, making us large amounts then continued making it for us for years that followed. 

I adored it, that and her raspberry jam. 

In the later years before we lost her to cancer, she sent me her recipe, it was an honor and still treasured to this day. 

in my long career I’ve served this in many variations, while it isn’t the exact recipe (that stays with the family) this recipe is a dedication or a plaque to my second mum Alison. this recipe will live forever in my heart….just like her.

Ingredients 

2kg old Tomato’s (old, soft and wrinkly are the best)

500g Onion diced 

5 cloves Garlic sliced 

100g olive oil 

4 tsp Mixed herbs

2 tsp Sage 

2 tsp Thyme

4 Bay leaf

1 stick fresh Rosemary

50g Vinegar

50g Sugar

2 Tablespoon sea salt Salt 

Method 

Set up BBQ for direct cooking, start to burn tomato’s.

chuck in a couple of sticks of oak, apple or pear wood (wood chips fine), close that lid and smoke. 

Pour oil into a sauce pan, add garlic and fry until garlic browns slightly.

Add onions and all herbs.

Sweat onions until translucent

Add sugar and vinegar, reduce until no liquid. 

Add rough chopped smoked tomato’s and any liquid that’s bled out, bring up to boil. 

Cover with a lid ,reduce heat to a low simmer, cook for an hour stirring every10 minutes. 

Season with salt and pepper 

Chef notes

This can be used as a base for many tomato sauces, BBQ, pasta, topping for pizza, hollandaise , blended into a pasatta? use this in recipes as you would, a tin of tomato’s .