Recipes  
Spaghetti Sauce (The Best)
Spaghetti Sauce (The Best)
Open in full-screen mode

Spaghetti Sauce (The Best)

5 stars (487) Rate this recipe
Preparation
40 MIN
Cooking
3 H 15 MIN
Freezes
Share
Looking for an Italian-inspired meat sauce for your spaghetti? This homemade recipe is the absolute best.

Ingredients

Preparation

  1. In a large saucepan, brown the meat in 30 ml (2 tablespoons) of the oil, half at a time, with the red pepper flakes. Add oil, if needed. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside in a bowl.
  2. In the same saucepan, soften the onions, carrots, celery, and garlic in the remaining oil. Season with salt and pepper. Add the tomato paste and cook for 1 minute over high heat.
  3. Add the meat, tomatoes, tomato sauce, broth, oregano, and cloves. Bring to a boil and simmer gently, stirring and scraping the bottom of the pan regularly, for about 3 hours or until it thickens. Serve over the pasta of your choice.

Note

Add fresh tomatoes?
Even if the period of abundance is upon us, you will not get the same result with peeled and seeded fresh tomatoes than with canned tomatoes, which are much softer.

Comments

  1. I've rated this five stars even though I added to it because it's such a lovely place to launch from creatively! I added 1 small zucchini from the garden and about 10 small brown mushrooms, 2 carrots 2 celery stalks and added the oregano and also 2 teaspoons of italian herbs + 1/2 teas of cumin seeds while softening the onion and vegetables. To the meat, sauce, broth stage I added 1/2 c red wine. I placed some fresh herbs like basil, thyme and a bay leaf on top and will remove later. No lack of depth here!

  2. I made this recipe and it's very good. I have stored the food in macon jars and put them in the hot oven at 400 for 10 minutes to ensure they preserve. Unfortunately, they did not preserve, most of my pots got mouldy within a few weeks. Does anyone know why this happened? thank you

  3. For the celery is it just 4 ribs ir 4 whole stalks? Also for the tomatoes is it 2 cans each or 2 cans totaling 28oz?

  4. I have been using this recipe for years now. I've made some tweaks some people may like. I add about 10 finely chopped mushrooms or two medium size portebellos and reduce the carrots to 2. I add spices as I find it is missing quite a few. I add: 2 tspns of Italian Seasoning 1 tbsp Salt (to taste really) 1 tbsp Sugar (to cut the acidity a bit) 1 tspn to a tbpn of fresh ground pepper half a tspn of dry mustard half a tspn of rosemary I feel this really makes it pop

  5. close to my own recipe, i add mushrooms , broccoli. I also remove the sausages casings and make meat balls with the meat, along with lean ground meat. I use Costco Victoria Marinara sauce.

  6. Hello. New cooker here. Please help me. For following; "2 cans 28 oz (796 ml) diced Italian tomatoes 2 cans 28 oz (796 ml) tomato sauce ..." Are the listed ml the TOTAL amount or the amount of EACH can should be and thus we need 2? I ask because diced tomatoes only come in 796ml cans where I shop. Thanks so much if anyone can answer this for me.

  7. Attn: Gus J. Celery is defined differently in most countries. CDN sticks=ribs. That's a single 'rib' of celery. CDN brunch=stalk. I think it is the same definition as in the US. You will find in many recipes that there is an equal number of carrots as celery. So 4 carrots = 4 sticks, or 'ribs' of celery.

  8. Excellent recipe! Well done, a keeper!!

  9. Add in 1-2 bay leaves, extra oregano, parsley flakes and extra salt. Its a great recipe just does need a little more for the volume.

  10. Husband and guests found that this taste like homemade catelli. I’ve never eaten catelli, but seeing as it’s canned spaghetti sauce I didn’t exactly take it as a compliment. I like it, but I prefer my own sauce which is even simpler but is full of fresh herbs. This sauce lacks depth. It needs fresh basil, thyme, and oregano. I also had to add a bit of honey to cut the acidity of the tomatoes (and it did wonders). Overall it’s good, but there are better sauces out there.

  11. when you say cloves you mean like cloves you use on ham, how to you remove them after or do you

  12. Excellent flavor with a slight kick from the chilli flakes, cloves add a pleasant aroma and taste. Sauce boasts a rich red eye appealing color . I have about a cup of red wine I am contemplating adding . However, this sauce tastes fabulous as is!!!!

  13. Excellent spaghetti sauce. This is definitely going to be my go-to sauce going forward. Thank you so very much for sharing!!

  14. Must admit that i'm very disappointed with this recipe. In my opinion it lacks in flavor. It needs more punch. All i can taste is the tomatoes. unfortunaltely the taste of the italian sausage gets lost in this sea of tomatoes. It's a decent base but i would suggest adding whatever ingredients fits your palate because it's pretty much flat. A couple tsp of oregano isnt nearly enough to properly flavor the sauce.

  15. We were visiting friends in the summer and they served this for dinner - we never ask for seconds and both did on this occasion! My friend shared the recipe and I've now made this several times as it has become our favourite pasta sauce. We're addicted!

Rate this recipe

Login to rate this recipe and write a review.

Login

Not a member yet? Sign up today, it's free!

Due to the large number of questions we receive, we are unable to answer each one. Please visit our Frequently Asked Questions section, which contains a great deal of useful information. We appreciate your enthusiasm for RICARDO cuisine!

Fields marked with an asterisk (*) are required.

Your comment must comply with our netiquette.

512 characters maximum

Healthy Pick

Recipes with the "Healthy Pick" stamp have been evaluated by a registered dietitian member of the Ordre professionnel des diététistes du Québec.