Time saver: whip up a fresh-tasting pizza sauce in no time.

I’ve been making a lot of pizza recently, and as a result I’ve been running out of the tomato paste I’d normally use for the pizza sauce. So, to save a trip to the supermarket I figured I’d make my own. It takes a little longer (not too much longer once you know what you’re doing), but tastes great and is definitely worth it.

This works really well on the New York Style Pepperoni and Mushroom, Blue Cheese and Pesto pizzas. I make this in a large saucepan since the bigger surface area leads to faster reduction.

Pizza Sauce (makes enough for two 12-14″ pizzas)

• 400g tin chopped tomatoes
• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 clove or ½ tsp crushed/finely chopped garlic
• 2 tsp sugar
• ½ tsp oregano
• ½ tsp salt
• (optional) freshly cracked black pepper to taste (crack over sauce once it’s spread on the pizza base)
• (optional) 1 small onion, peeled, cut in half along equator OR 2 celery stalks cut in half lengthwise, chopped into 10cm lengths – these are used to imbue a bit of flavour, but are removed from the sauce before it’s used

1. Heat oil in large saucepan, then add garlic and onion/celery if using. Saute briefly, then add tomatoes, sugar, oregano and salt.
2. Stir frequently to prevent the sauce from catching, and keeping on a high heat, reduce down to about a quarter of the starting volume.
3. Remove saucepand from heat, and then remove onion/celery from sauce and discard.
4. The sauce may still have a few bigger chunks of tomato in it – I like these, but you could mash/blend/stick-mix them out.
5. Spread 3-4 Tbsp over each pizza base, then season evenly with freshly cracked black pepper.
6. If you’re only making one pizza you can freeze the leftover sauce, or keep it in the fridge for a couple of days.