Homemade Pizza Sauce in Under 30 Minutes

On a Friday or Saturday night, I love to whip up a homemade pizza. Ordering delivery pizza gets old after a while and I like to be able to make the perfect pizza to fulfill my cravings! Also I do have to eat a gluten-free diet due to my Celiac Disease, but it is more the fact that I enjoy the pizza assembly process. After a long day of work or running around, I love being able to destress by jumping in the kitchen. Honestly by the time that a pizza could be delivered, my homemade pizza has already come out of the oven so what is there to lose? (FYI-currently my favorite gluten free crusts are Olivia superfree gluten-free pizza crust or I will make a cauliflower crust. I don’t usually make my traditional gluten-free crust from scratch because gluten-free baking is tricky and when I want a pizza in under an hour, I just don’t have time to waste!)

Below is my outline for my 30 minute pizza sauce. Disclaimer: For me, pizza isn’t about exact ingredients or exact measurements because everyone likes their pizza differently which is the beauty of making it yourself! 🙂

Yields– 1-2 cups of sauce (enough for 1 regular/large pizza)

Ingredients:

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/4 onion (diced)
• 1-2 garlic cloves (minced)
• 1 medium tomato (diced)
  • Optional: you can add 1/2 red bell pepper for sweetness (diced)
• 1-2 “glugs” of red wine (or approximately 1/8 cup)
  • My recommendation would be a medium to full bodied red
• 1 can (15 oz) of good quality tomato sauce (not pre-made pasta sauce)
  • or you can use the equivalent of tomato paste or concentrate and water
• salt – to taste
• black pepper – to taste
• 1/4-1/2 tablespoon of oregano
• 1/4-1/2 tablespoon of basil
• 1/2 teaspoon Red pepper flakes
  • Optional, but the little bit of heat really balances the other flavors
• 2 tablespoons of freshly grated parmesan cheese (optional)

Directions:

Place a medium size pot over medium heat on your stove and add in your olive oil. After the oil has warmed up, add your onions and a pinch of salt. After a few minutes your onions should become more translucent and develop color, when you see this you can add your garlic. Keep an eye on your garlic, because it can burn easily. Stir the onions and garlic for a minute or two, you should be able to smell the garlic after the heat warms it up. Now you can throw in your diced tomato to break that down in the pan for a minute or two.

For the fun part, you will now deglaze the pan with your red wine. You don’t need much but the wine will help release the flavor from the bottom of the pan and add depth to the sauce. Take a wooden spoon and really scrape the brown bits off the bottom of the pan and let the wine do it’s magic–you may need to turn your heat up to medium high, and your wine/alcohol will cook out which will take a minute or two. Next you can add your can of tomato sauce and since this is not seasoned you will want to add salt and pepper. Stir everything around and then add your dry herbs: oregano, basil, and red pepper flakes.

Keep the sauce bubbling over medium to medium-high heat because it should reduce down slightly. Keep stirring every few minutes until your sauce is at the consistency you like (this should take no more than 5-10 minutes). If you have fresh parmesan, you will grate that into your sauce now and finally you will taste for seasoning. And you’re done!

Spoon onto your pizza crust and finish with your favorite cheese and toppings before popping into the oven.

This recipe is flexible but also fool-proof using basic ingredients. Please let me know if you try it out this weekend! 🙂