Roasted Tomato Sauce for Pizza
Recipe by Peter Campbell
It’s Pizza Week in the AZ Cooks kitchen, and we’ve recruited our friend and pizza guru Peter Campbell, chef/owner of Minneapolis’ Red Wagon Pizza Co., to share his tips for creating restaurant-quality pizza at home. In this recipe, Campbell chars whole tomatoes before roasting them in the oven with garlic and herbs, adding a rich depth of flavor to the pizza sauce. The extra effort will take your homemade pizza to the next level.
Watch Peter Campbell make this recipe:
Andrew Zimmern Cooks: Roasted Tomato Sauce
Ingredients
- 6 large tomatoes, cored
- 6 whole cloves garlic, peeled
- 2 tablespoons fresh oregano leaves
- 6 basil leaves
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste
- Salt
- Pepper
Instructions
Place the tomatoes directly over the flame of a gas stove top burner, and cook until charred, about 5 minutes. (Alternatively, you can broil tomatoes until blackened, or roast them in a 350-degree F oven for about an hour.)
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Place the tomatoes on a baking sheet, along with the garlic, oregano and basil. Drizzle with olive oil and place in the oven to roast for 30 minutes.
Add the contents of the baking sheet to the bowl of a food processor and pulse until pureed. Add the tomato paste and pulse to combine. Taste the sauce, and adjust the seasoning as needed. If your sauce seems too thin or watery, you can add more tomato paste or place it in a saucepan and reduce over medium heat until thickened.
