This Homemade Marinara Sauce is tomato based with added olive oil, garlic and fresh basil. It’s the perfect easy marinara sauce recipe to add to freshly cooked pasta. Watch the video showing you how to make this recipe, then scroll to the bottom of this post and print out the recipe so you can make it at home.
Homemade Marinara Sauce:
Soooooo, are you a jarred spaghetti sauce kind of family? Guilty here. Some jarred sauces have an off-taste, mostly too sweet due to (unnecessary) added sugar. I do have to say though that I love Classico’s Tomato-Basil variety, and I use it more often than not.
But then I received Kelsey Banfield’s cookbook The Naptime Chef in the mail. I flipped through her book trying to decide from the oodles of delicious-sounding recipes what I wanted to make. Since I had never made Homemade Marinara Sauce, this easy marinara sauce recipe caught my eye. It makes the house smell amazing, and it turns out to be much better than anything in the jar.
What’s the difference between Marinara Sauce and Spaghetti Sauce?
Marinara sauce recipes usually involve a base of tomatoes, garlic, olive oil and basil. There really isn’t such thing as “spaghetti sauce,” since spaghetti is just pasta that you can add any sauce to. Many people add marinara sauce to spaghetti, and others prefer a marinara sauce with ground beef added to it.
Just 6 simple ingredients turn this recipe into 6 cups of marinara sauce. I usually use up all my sauce in just one recipe, but you can certainly use some now and the rest later! I like to make ahead in mass quantities! Here’s the super-simple how-to:
How to make Marinara Sauce:
Heat some olive oil in a pan.
Add a bunch of sliced garlic and cook it in the oil until your whole kitchen smells of garlic and the garlic itself is golden. I have a garlic press that has a dual-chamber press and slicer, which makes slicing garlic VERY easy to do.
Tear apart 4 large leaves of fresh basil and stir those into the garlic in the pan.
Pour in two 28-ounce cans of crushed tomatoes with their juices, and bring that mixture to a boil.
Add Kosher salt and reduce the heat to a simmer. Simmer for about 45 minutes, swirl in a couple of teaspoons of balsamic vinegar, and your sauce is done! See how easy it is to make homemade marinara sauce?
How long is Homemade Marinara Sauce good for?
- To store: cool the sauce to room temperature before storing. It will keep in a covered container in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks, and it will keep in a covered freezer-safe container for up to 3 months.
Kelsey Banfield is a fellow food blogger friend of mine, and her debut cookbook, The Naptime Chef, was released on March 12th, 2012. Kelsey has always loved to cook. When her daughter was born, time for cooking became more challenging. Kelsey began using her daughter’s nap times to reinvent her favorite recipes and create quick meals, leaving her more time to spend with her family.
You certainly don’t have to have any nap-age children to utilize The Naptime Chef cookbook. My son is well past nap-age (though I’d certainly love it if he took a snoozer once in a while), yet I’m excited to try the following recipes from this book: Strawberries and Cream Overnight French Toast, Caramel-Stuffed Cinnamon Muffins, Creamy Parmesan and Chive Polenta, Summer Gazpacho, Bistro Steak with Gorgonzola Sauce, Sticky Orange Drumsticks, Chocolate- Zucchini Loaf, and Uncle Will’s Dirty Blondies. Everything looks so good! I’m thinking this would make a lovely gift for a baby shower too 🙂
Here are a few more homemade pasta sauce recipes you might enjoy:
- Red Pepper Tomato Sauce
- Ina Garten’s Pine Nut and Walnut Pesto Sauce
- Weeknight Italian Sausage Pasta Sauce
- Mom’s Spaghetti Sauce
- White Clam Sauce
If you happen to be following the Weight Watchers WW plan, you will find a link to the WW Points on the recipe card below.
Homemade Marinara Sauce
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 8 medium garlic cloves, thinly sliced
- 4 large fresh basil leaves, torn into small pieces
- Two 28-ounce cans crushed tomatoes, with their juices
- 2 teaspoons Kosher salt
- 2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
Instructions
- In a large saucepan or deep skillet, warm the olive oil at low heat. Add the garlic and cook until golden, about 3 minutes. Stir in the basil.
- Pour in the tomatoes with their juices, bring the sauce to a boil, and then add the Kosher salt. Reduce the heat to low and simmer 45 to 50 minutes. As the sauce thickens toward the end, stir in the balsamic vinegar. Remove the pan from heat.
Notes
- To store: cool the sauce to room temperature before storing. It will keep in a covered container in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks, and it will keep in a covered freezer-safe container for up to 3 months.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
HI!
I love your blog! My favorite food to make is a dish called “Pata de Puerco con con Frijoles y Papas” which translates to Pig Foot with Beans and Potatoes”. I don’t actually use pig foot, but use pork meat. My mom used to make this and now I make it for my family. It’s my children’s favorite meal!
One of my favorite things for an easy dinner is tacos.
Anything pasta! Even if it is just angel hair with butter and salt. Always looking for more recipes and this marinara looks easy as well as yummy. Might add some cooked pureed carrots to make it sweeter for my girls.
Something quick, like pork teaks, or something that stretches to feed our family of six, like spaghetti pie, or stuffed bread. Always looking for new ideas…..
Panini or frittata!
I love large batch cooking for the freezer so that I can pull something out at the last minute and have an awesome meal in a hurry! Tonight…Teal’s Mexican Chicken with Black Beans. We can either eat it over rice or spread it on a heated burrito shell for a yummy wrap. We LOVE it!
In winter, our favourite is braised beef. (Or chicken!). In summer, probably ditto, though grilled. I would be a bad vegetarian!
I love to make Good Seasons Italian chicken in a crock pot. Put several pieces of chicken with the skin on in a crock pot. Sprinkle one packet of Good Seasons Italian Dressing Mix evenly over the chicken, pop on the lid, and cook on low for 6-8 hours. The aroma and chicken are to die for!! Enjoy.
I love to make anything Mexican! My favorite is chicken enchiladas with white green chile sauce.
favorite thing to make is farfalle pasta tossed in pesto with steamed cauliflower and grape tomatoes. fast, healthy and very good.