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| "The Sauce" |
My destiny to serve authentic sauce on top of pasta was
sealed when I said yes to Sal Marotta’s proposal of marriage. Marottas do not
do bottled or (gasp) canned marinara. My soon-to-be mother-in-law Emily offered
a lesson in the sauce before the wedding.
I was an eager student. I had tasted the sauce. It was thick,
rich, dark red, and memorable.
To this day the sauce is my only true claim to
culinary skills.
Making the sauce is not about the recipe. It
is about the experience. I learned that
a layered rich sauce must begin at the start, with the starter. The starter is the heart of the sauce. It is the legacy of all the sauces that have
come before . . . it is stored in the freezer.
Sal’s Great Aunt Julia had rows and rows of starter in her freezer. She called it her “blood bank.” My Sal’s grandfather,
Grandpa Sal, brought the idea of starter sauce to America from Sicily when he
immigrated. Grandpa Sal had a full kitchen in his garage so he could cook the
sauce with more space and ventilation without getting nagged about the
mess. He taught Emily (another
non-Italian who needed the secrets), and Emily taught me. It took us all day in the kitchen and much wine
for the recipe as well as the lesson itself.
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| Great Aunt Julia |
On the day of my lesson Sal’s mom confidently taught me how
to cook the sausage, onions, garlic, and then to brown the paste- incorporating
all the flavors. All the while the heart
of the sauce sat patiently slow warming on a separate stove top coil. Side by side we layered the flavors by
combining starter and paste, wine and herbs. By evening I learned the Marotta
stories, was advised against putting oregano in the meatballs (it is mutinous
and can cause loud Italian fighting), and more than anything that the
sauce was a legacy. I was part of the family and trusted to carry the
tradition forward.
It has been thirty years since my lesson. I now have my own
tradition of warming the starter in early September. I spend the day browning
the paste and incorporating the new sauce to make a batch that will last us
throughout the fall and winter, leaving a little extra starter for next year. So far I have taught my oldest daughter the
process, who has added a playlist to her cooking, and expect someday my
youngest will ask for her turn in the kitchen with me.
Because everyone knows you can’t feed an Italian family
properly without the sauce.
The inspiration for this post came when I met a remarkable
person named Sarah Shotts at the Arkansas Women’s Bloggers Conference last
month. As soon as she told me about her
dream to record “heirloom recipes” across the world I knew I found a friend. If
you or someone you know has a passion for family, food, and film please visit
her Kickstarter “Project STIR.”
