Rao's
Ask Lemmy
A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions
Rules: (interactive)
1) Be nice and; have fun
Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them
2) All posts must end with a '?'
This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?
3) No spam
Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.
4) NSFW is okay, within reason
Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either [email protected] or [email protected].
NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].
5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions.
If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email [email protected]. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.
Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.
Partnered Communities:
Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu
Damn. You're fancy. That was like over seven dollars a jar at Aldi. Been curious though.
It's very good. Kenji Lopez-Alt swears by it, and if it's good enough for him, it's good enough for me lol. I get it at Costco, and I don't think it was that expensive.
IDK who that guy is, but if you trust him, I trust him.
Rao's is basically more sauce per jar than other brands because it's not watered down to slime. I can sauce easily twice as many servings of pasta from a jar of Rao's than Classico or Prego.
They did just get bought out so this is probably only true for another year or so.
Ya, I hate sauces that are watery and full of sugar. Give me the thicccc red sauce with a little bit of acid. Been wanting to try Rao, but it was expensive the last time I saw. Maybe I will get some this weekend before they fully transition to watery slop for that important bottom line.
It's basically ghe only brand not full of added sugar.
Ya. I hate that shit. I prefer my foods to be more acidic, and everything has so much damn sugar which cuts the acidity to me. Why is red pasta sauce sweet? idk I hate it though.
I got two big jars for 9.98 at Sam's today. They're each almost twice the size of what Walmart carries, which is almost $5 a jar. 44 oz for $10 vs 13 oz for $5
It makes an excellent pizza sauce for home made pizzas too.
Straight-up out of the jar onto your pasta, I think Raos is probably the best widely available option.
That said, I have yet to meet a jarred pasta sauce that didn't benefit from a bit of tweaking, some extra herbs/spices, a splash of wine, some cheese, sauteing up some extras garlic & onions, etc.
In general, I don't tend to think of jarred sauce as a totally finished product, it's more of a shortcut that lets you skip most of the more labor intensive parts of making a sauce from scratch and skip to the finishing touches. Even the most lackluster bargain brand sauce can usually be dressed up to a pretty damn good sauce without too much effort.
My usual process is to finely chop up some onions and garlic, give that a good saute with some olive oil, maybe deglaze with some wine, add the sauce, then season to taste with some herbs & spices (normally oregano, basil, rosemary, black pepper, red pepper flakes will be a pretty safe bet, but I get a bit weird with it sometimes, taste as you go) finish it off with some Parmesan cheese, and of course a bit of the pasta water.
I usually do a meat sauce with a similar idea, I also finish my sauce before I start heating water for pasta. The new ingredients really benefit from time simmering with the sauce in my opinion.
Ya, I agree, they all need a bit of personalized flavor profiles. I used to take out the jars, heat 'em up in a pot, spice them up, but it gets to laborious and the sauce pops all over the stovetop and now I have to do dishes.
Was coming here to post this. Rao's Marinara Sauce is the best out of a jar.
Seriously, get some Italian bread, pour a little bit of Rao's into a bowl, dip a piece of the bread in there, enjoy.
Recently I've just been doing cento crushed tomatoes (canned). You need to season it (at least salt and pepper dear God) and ideally add some onion and garlic, maybe mushrooms or meat. But I'm also the type to add additional seasoning and ingredients to "finished" store bought sauces anyway, so maybe you're looking for something more complete
That sounds an awful lot like cooking to me
As opposed to serving cold pasta sauce on dry pasta or fresh pasta straight from the fridge?
Throw a container of fresh deli salsa in it. Garlic, onion, tomato chunks, herbs, you'd be shocked how well it turns out.
I’m gonna assume you mean best cheap jarred sauce.
I think Newman’s Own and Classico are the best under $3 at King Soopers.
One jar of classico tomato basil sauce One yellow onion chopped One can of diced tomatoes A few cloves of garlic chopped lots more basil butter trace amounts: cayenne, cumin
Meanwhile you’re browning some 80/20 ground beef in another skillet, and mix all that in including the fat at the end
Newman's
Jerry!
Love the Newman's. Not quite as good as my grandmother's but pretty good. I'll usually tweak it a little bit to make it even better, but when when I can't it's good.
Kirkland brand from Costco is actually pretty good.
If not that, Rao's though I prefer Kirkland.
It's fairly plain on its own, so especially great if you are going to throw in anything extra, like fresh herbs or mushrooms or stuff.
Edit: Also, pro tip - the key to great sauce is saving a cup of the pasta water and throwing back in as you mix with the sauce.
I keep hearing Rao is good. Might need to try that one. Never tried Costco's. They typically have decent products, so maybe I will try some. Do you know if the Costco one has added sugar? I hate sweet red sauce.
No. Here's the only ingredients:
INGREDIENTS: organic tomatoes, organic onions, organic carrots, organic tuscan pgi extra virgin olive oil, organic basil, sea salt.
Barilla FTW. But it actually depends on the country you buy it. I notice it tastes significantly better in Europe than Latinamerica for some reason...
Unfortunately, I am not in Europe. Please send me some! My American taste buds need some good read sauce.
Probably has to do with more (?) control over what goes into foods that Europeans eat.
Ages ago, I read about a recipe by the 'grandmother of Italian cooking' for an incredibly simple pasta sauce. I can attest it makes a very tasty sauce and it's so easy, even a cooking dunce like me can't fuck it up (yet). And if you want to add extra spices or herbs as an experiment, that only increases the flavour.
Her main premise was... why waste time chopping an onion into little bits? As our old pal Kevin would say, everyone is going to get to know each other in the pot! You take an onion, peel it, chop it in half, chuck it in a pan with one or two cheap tins of tomato. Add a healthy chunk of (salted) butter. Stir occasionally, she recommends 30 mins but ain't nobody got time fo' that. I usually do 15 or 20. Add salt to taste, remove the onion (as an aside, the onion will now be sweet and edible on its own), et voila.
The secret ingredient of a shit ton of butter haha. That's giving me some inspiration and motivation. Does it matter the tins of tomato? Crushed, peeled, ect.?
You can always improve the flavor in your sauce. I'm not familiar with Aldi brand, but keep a few things on hand to give it the flavor you like.
Some of my favorite not-so-secret ingredients:
A splash of red wine or a tablespoon of grape jam for sweetness
Onion powder and garlic powder. Yes, fresh is better, but if you're starting with a jar of inexpensive sauce, get over yourself.
Soy sauce to make it saltier
Fish sauce or msg for more umami
Bay leaf, basil, oregano, or whatever preferred herbs you have on hand
If it's too acidic, add a teaspoon of baking soda.
Sometime I want to make the sauce a bit thinner, depending on the dish. I take a tablespoon of tomato paste and mix it into a cup of beef stock or water.
I just make my own and freeze it.
Olive oil, carrot, onion, garlic, ground beef, pork sausage, nduja, canned peeled tomatoes, and red wine, plus herbs to match your preferred flavor profile (I prefer thyme, but rosemary, oregano, basil, even sage work too). Salt to taste.
I put in medium sized mason jars and throw them in the freezer, them pull out a jar and put it in the fridge a day before I know I'm going to use it.
You can also put the sauce in a plastic bag and freeze laying flat on a plate. If it's got all that surface area exposed it'll thaw enough to use in just a few minutes instead of overnight.
Classico is great if you're on a budget and it has plenty of variety. If you're not going to make it but want it to be as good as possible I recommend Rao's, it's expensive but really good, the Alfredo sauce is great too
In the realm of jarred tomato sauce available at your local mega Mart:
If you like actual chunks of veggie in your sauce,Bertolli rustic cut is outstanding but getting hard to find.
If you're looking for something for a baked bread dish like pizza or as a marinara dip, Victoria White linen is really good.
Rao's Ariabiata has a nice little kick that won't kill your guests
That last one sounds perfect. I love me some kick, give it to me so that it burns going in and burns coming out.
It's expensive and probably not available in a majority of the country, but Michael's of Brooklyn is a straight banger. I found it while I was living in Brooklyn and when I moved away I was sad I wouldn't be able to buy it anymore, but a few months back my local store started stocking it lol.
Bertolli
Recently I've been buying "Yo Mama's" sauce (no it's not the setup to a joke, it's actually called that). I first picked it up because it has lower amounts of sugar and salt then most retail sauces and liked the taste enough to keep buying it. It's fairly pricey though, usually eight or nine dollars online, but the local Grocery Outlet (a discount store in case you don't have them in your area) usually sells it for around five-ish.
One problem though, the lack of preservatives combined with the low salt and sugar means a jar can start to go bad relatively quickly. I've had more than one jar go fuzzy because I decided to take a week long break from eating pasta.
Can you freeze what you don't eat? I have similar issues because it's hard to cook for one without having to then eat the leftovers for a week...
If they have it in your area, get Mid's. It costs a little more than the Newman's/Classico/Bertolli but it also comes in a bigger jar.
If not, one of those other three is fine. And even if you don't care for the flavors you can always jazz up the plain marinara yourself in so many ways (add garlic, basil, a parmesan rind, dried mushrooms, a splash of white wine, etc).
I have never heard of Mid's but I will check it out and hunt it down.
Prego makes a mushroom/sausage jar that is actually hella good. Also, mixed vegetables Prego. If I'm trying to class up a plain jar of red sauce, adding a whole can of diced tomatoes gives it a push. Raid your spice cabinet for flavors you like (and if you have citric acid, add a pinch)
Mostly the whole process takes <5mins