This can be made either on the stove top or in the oven. If you want to do it in the oven, you need a casserole/stewpot, and preheat the oven to 190 degrees C. If you cook it on the stove top you will need a saucepan, otherwise it is going to make the hell of a mess.
What you need:
Olive oil
Garlic
Onions (red or white or spring)
Fresh sweet tomatoes – about eight
Tomato purée – ideally Italian
Chilli flakes (optional good to have, not need to have)
Chicken bouillon / stock
Maple syrup or honey (if you have sweet tooth)
Fresh basil (optional good to have, not need to have)
Ground white pepper
If you want a smooth sauce, you will need a blitzer, or a hand blitzer.
What you do:
Chop garlic roughly – shouting “take that, you bastard!” always seems to help the cooking process
Chop onion – equally brutally – see above for advice on encouragement
Stick two glugs of olive oil into a saucepan on a low gas flame
(Cook’s Tip #1: Glug.
Hold thumb over the olive oil bottle’s mouth, tip over pan, release thumb, you will hear two “glug noises”, replace thumb, job done.)
Fry onion and garlic until translucent – about 10 minutes
Roughly chop tomatoes
When the onion and garlic have softened, add the chopped tomatoes
Stir together, and add one heaped dessertspoon of tomato purée
Make up about half a pint of boiling chicken stock, add to tomato mixture
Add half teaspoon of chilli flakes (if you want a punchy, in-yer-face sauce)
Bring to boil and then reduce to a simmer.
Either cover and cook on the stove top for two hours on a very low flame, or transfer to the casserole/stewpot and sling it in the oven (preheated to 190 degrees C if you have forgotten already), also for about two hours.
Check taste. If a sweeter sauce is wanted, add a dessertspoon of maple syrup.
Add the basil at this stage if wanted.
Cook for about 15 more minutes.
Let it cool down, then blitz if smooth sauce wanted. Remember?
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