This tomato sauce recipe can be made either tangy or sweet, depending on your choice of vinegar.
Published in 2012 in “The Downstairs Cookbook. Recipes from a 1920’s Kitchen” (originally published as The Margaret Powell Cookery Book in 1970).
Ingredients
1 lb or 480gm of tomatoes – chopped
1 small onion – chopped
2oz or 60gm of diced ham
4 teaspoons of butter
1 bay leaf
cayenne pepper
pinch of salt
6 teaspoons vinegar (I used white wine vinegar for a tangy sauce but a sweet balsamic vinegar would also be very nice)
2 1/2 Australian/UK tablespoons or 3 US tablespoons of corn flour (known as corn starch in the US)
Method
Put the tomatoes, onions, ham and seasonings in a saucepan and cook over a gentle heat for 5 minutes.
Add the vinegar and simmer until all the ingredients are completley softened.
Turn off the heat and either rub through a coarse seive or remove thebay leaf and blitz in a blender.
Return the mix to the saucepan if you removed it :)
Mix the corn flour to a paste with some water and add to the cooked mixture.
Stir over a low heat until thick.
Serve with meat or use in a recipe that calls for tomato sauce.
