My aunt set me straight on adding sugar to tomato sauce

I had a conversation with my aunt last Sunday that really made me rethink my whole approach to pasta sauce. She's 72 and has been making sauce from her garden tomatoes for decades, always with a pinch of sugar. I used to think that was basically cheating, like you were covering up for bland tomatoes or something. But she looked me straight in the eye and said, 'Sugar doesn't hide bad flavor, it just brings out the natural sweetness that's already there. It's like salt for tomatoes.' That hit different because she grew the tomatoes herself from seed, so she knows exactly what she's talking about. I tried it with my batch this week and it honestly made my sauce taste more like itself, not less. Has anyone else had a family member change their mind on a cooking rule they thought was solid?

2 comments

2 Comments

davis.ivan12d ago

Wait she grows her own tomatoes from seed AND still adds sugar? That's wild. I always thought the sugar trick was for store-bought cans that taste like nothing. But if she's putting it in sauce from her own garden tomatoes, that changes everything. Your aunt sounds like she's been doing this long enough to know what works. I might have to try this myself, honestly.

jason_stone12d ago

Tried it last summer. Big difference in flavor. Never going back.