Seaweed miso vegetable soup

When I learned that Koreans eat seaweed soup for breakfast, I became curious and asked my Korean friends for pointers to the proper way of making it. It turned out to be a delicious yet really simple dish that serves as a nice platform for variations. We combined the recipe with miso soup and now eat this as a super healthy yet tasty comfort food.

Ingredients for 2-3 people:

• A large pinch of dried seaweed, Korean miyeok or Japanese wakame.
• A few garlic cloves, minced. I typically use 3-5.
• 1 TBS miso paste (do not go too heavy on miso, it will overpower eveything else)
• Tofu, cubed to 1/2 inch. A few TBS.
• 1-2 cups of vegetables, e.g. sliced cabbage, small cubes of butternut squash, chopped carrots, cubed turnips... Make sure that any root vegetables or squash are cut into 1/4 inch pieces to cook quickly.
• 1-2 TBS oil, I prefer extra virgin olive
• Dashi or water - about 500-750ml
• Seasoning: a subset of 1 TBS soy sauce, 1 TBS sesame oil

Method:

1. Soak seaweed in cold water for 10-15 minutes.
2. Drain the water, rinse the seaweed (optional), and gently squeeze out the liquid.
3. Heat the oil in a medium sized pot on a medium heat.
4. Add the minced garlic, cook for 30 seconds until fragrant.
5. Add the drained seaweed, cook for 1-2 minutes.
6. Add the dashi, vegetables, and miso paste. Stir well.
7. Add the tofu, gently stir it in.
8. Bring the soup to the boil and simmer for 5-10 minutes, until the vegetables and the seaweed are cooked.
1. Note: Cutting all the vegetables into small pieces helps with cooking time, and assures all the vegetables are cooked at the same time.
9. Turn the heat off.
10. Optionally: Season with sesame oil and soy sauce. I like to add those to the plate.
11. Yum!

Note: Sometimes we ladle the soup into our bowls over leftover grains (quinoa works really well) and cooked beans, or we add a bit of potato in the soup - and make a meal of it. Not traditional at all, but it completes the nutrients and fiber in the meal.

Soba making notes

We love soba. To the point that once I had a Tokyo layover after an overnight flight from Singapore, I took the train to the city to have some great soba noodles at Honmura An. Quite a trek for a bowl of noodles.

I tried my hand a making soba several times, with rather limited success. Here is an example where I was not able to roll the noodles as thinly as I should, they were hard to separate, and super fragile to cook. They were, however, tasty!

When we got a grain mill, I set a challenge for myself to learn how to make soba from 100% buckwheat. Sadly, I think my confidence has not been there: The lack of success in early attempts, consistent YouTube videos that making 100% buckwheat soba takes a lifetime to master, and statements from Japanese soba makers in their YouTube videos that humidity and kitchen temperature matter,  soba needed to be specially milled, a special bowl was used... None of that was particularly encouraging.

Something happened on the New Year's Eve 2020. Our MD sent out an email, saying how eating soba was a Japanese tradition for the New Year's Eve. I think I really wanted the awful 2020 to be over, so I took another look at recipes for home-made soba and found one that I attempted. And it worked beautifully. The noodles were not buckwheat flour only, but it was gluten free, which mattered as our gluten tolerance appears to be suspect. Additions to the four were psyllium husk and arrowroot powder, which I substituted with tapioca starch, that was what I had. The dough formed really nicely, I was able to roll it out thinly, noodles were easy to separate, and the flavor was stunningly delicious. I suspect freshly milled buckwheat may have played a role.

In my fear to compress the noodles too much, I cut them much wider than I would have normally, but there was no need for that. I left half of the dough for the next day, and the noodles were still perfect.

So, the quest is back on. My sincere hope is that this becomes something like crepes for me. My first attempt produced nothing but misery, which made me thinks crepes were really hard. Today I make them many different ways with more confidence that I probably should exhibit - I literally stopped measuring.

Here is the soba recipe I tried. I plan to use it as a starting point and start inching towards the 100% buckwheat, but even if I don't quite make it there, now I have confidence I can easily made delicious soba on my own. One thing I do know I need to adjust - get from volume measurements to weight, that is so much more reliable.

Soba with psyllium husk and tapioca starch

Ingredients (2-4 servings)

• 1 cup buckwheat flour
• 1/2 cup starch (I used tapioca)
• 1/4 tsp sea salt
• 1 TBS psyllium husk dissolved in 4 TBS water for about 2 minutes
• 1 TBS olive oil
• 6-8 TBS water (I needed 8)

Method

1. Mix the flour, the starch and the sea salt in a medium to large bowl
2. Add the husk, olive oil, and 6 TBS water
3. Mix with your hand until a moist but not sticky dough forms.
1. Add the remaining two TBS water if the dough doesn't come together
4. Knead the dough, first in the bowl, then on a board until it becomes soft, somewhat elastic, and easy to work with.
1. Note: I did not need to add any flour to the board, but you may need to
5. Divide the dough into two balls. If not using immediately, wrap each ball well into plastic wrap.
6. Sprinkle your board with buckwheat flour
7. Roll out the dough thinly, adding more flour as needed - make sure the dough doesn't stick.
8. Cut the noodles:
1. Pizza cutter works.
2. I sprinkled the noodles with a bit more buckwheat flour, folded them, and then cut them with a large cooking knife
9. Bring a large pot of water to boil. I added some salt to the water.
10. Boil the noodles for bout 2 minutes. I used a frying basket to hold a small batch of noodles so that I didn't need to fish them out.
11. Rinse the noodles immediately under cold water. This stops cooking and helps against sticking.
12. Eat any way you want.

Update on starch

From what I can tell, adding starch really is a matter of preference on the noodle texture. Starch adds some chewiness, which I like, so I keep using it.

Quiche, small and simple

There is something about quiche that makes me coming back to it. I think it is the custardy texture, and the umami that leaps out of a good slice of quiche. There are downsides, the main one being that a quiche can be really fatty and salty. One can make making and baking the crust infinitely complicated. All recipes assume a standard pie dish, or a 10 or 12 inch cast iron skillet, presumably making sure than an army can be well fed. Even though quiche does make great leftovers, making a smaller and lighter quiche has been something I have been after for a while.

The breakthrough was realizing that my 8 inch cast iron skillets have been collecting dust instead of being used as a fine baking dish. It is exactly the size that I have been looking for - the picture below shows what was left over after Jasna and I each had a slice.

Let me record the recipe here, so that I don't need to invent the wheel over and over again.

Ingredients for the crust

• 1 cup flour: I used 1/2 cup rye and 1/2 cup millet flour
• Optional but very useful: 1 TBS psyllium husk mixed in 4 TBS of water
• The husk adds elasticity to the dough and helps it hold together.
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 cup ice water
• 1/4 cup oil: I tend to use olive oil

Ingredients for the custard:

• 3 large eggs
• 3/4 cup milk: I used 1/4 cup soy milk and 1/2 cup whole milk
• parsley: a handful, chopped finely
• cheese, 1/2 cup or so: I used shredded parmesan, chèvre, and a touch of mystery aged cheese

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 375 F
2. If using psyllium husk, mix the husk with 4TBS water and let it stand for 2 minutes or so.
3. In a bowl, mix all the ingredients for the crust. Knead the soft dough to mix everything well.
4. Grease the skillet with butter. Oil does not stick to the sides all that well, hence I prefer using butter.
5. With your fingers, press the dough into evenly thick layer against the bottom and the sides of the skillet. Make sure the dough is not thicker around the inner edge of the skillet - where the sides and the bottom come together.
6. Bake the crust for 15 minutes. Note: With this dough I have never needed to weigh it or to pierce it with a fork.
7. Keep the oven going after the crust is prebaked, and take the skillet out. Remember to use oven mitts.
8. In a bowl, maybe the same one that you used for the crust, whisk the eggs, and then whisk in the milk and parsley.
9. Pour the mixture into the skillet. 
10. Add the cheese. I used a spoon and my hands to break off small pieces of chevre, I sprinkled some parmesan, and dotted the quiche with some aged cheese for extra flavor.
11. Stir the cheese and the milk mixture just a bit. 
    
    
    
    
    
12. Bake at 375 F for 35-40 minutes, until the custard has firmed up and got some color. It may puff up a bit,  but will deflate as the air bubbles cool down.
13. Cool the quiche just a bit and  use a spatula or a fish turner to take the quiche out of the skillet easily.

Note:

Feel free to add bacon, ham, steamed vegetables and so on. I have realized that we prefer to keep it simple, just eggs, cheese, and herbs for extra flavor and color.

There is no need to add salt to the eggs. The cheese will supply enough salt.

Potato pancakes with ricotta and celeriac

When I named this blog "Trivial food", I gave the name quite a bit of thought. Through the years my notion of good food shifted from "fancy with exotic ingredients" to the challenge that with good-quality every-day ingredients one should be able to make spectacular food.

Today I am pretty confident that we met the challenge. Our daily food is largely plant-based, vegetables and legumes abound, preparations require fairly basic techniques and a manageable dose of attention. Yet, every time when we go to a fancy restaurant we pretty much shrug and acknowledge it is for the experience. The quality of food we consume on the daily basis tends to meet the bar consistently. 

Thinking of dining experience, let me add an unsolicited plug for Sierra Mar, the restaurant at Post Ranch Inn. The food is beautiful and really well prepared, the ingredients are top notch, the service is ridiculously non-pretentious, and the view makes you extend a lunch to a two-hour event. That is something I cannot reproduce at home!

The topic of this post, however, are potato pancakes. A dish that must be trivial, it's really just grated potatoes mixed with a few additives and cooked on a griddle. Yet, around Hanukkah, every year internet surfaces an abundance of recipes and advice for how to make latkes or the pancakes perfectly. After looking at various recipes and making the dish several times, I do believe potato pancakes do qualify as trivial food. To get there, they need an uncommon twist.

That is, there are two key steps to making really good potato pancakes . The main one is to eliminate the excess moisture from the potatoes. In the original post I suggested squeezing the liquid out of grated potatoes with a paper towel. That is the standard method that works well, but it makes the pancakes trickier to cook so that they are cooked inside and not burned on the outside. 

Recently I saw a recipe recommending to use leftover mashed potatoes for the pancakes, and that gave me an idea: Cook or bake the potatoes first, then grate them and use that to make potatoes. I turned to my trusty instant pot, steamed russet potatoes for 10 minutes and graded them when they cooled down. Note that steaming results in incomparably better potatoes than boiling, and with an instant pot, it is much faster and reproducible than baking. I also decided to replace the flour with starch (corn, potato, tapioca) dissolved in a bit of cold water to help with crispiness. The result were literally perfect potato pancakes without any fuss or preparation challenges whatsoever. Very satisfying.

The second secret was to cook the pancakes at a medium to medium-low heat, slowly enough so that the outside only gets crispy and not burned while the inside is fully cooked. That recommendation stays even when using steamed potatoes. We still want to minimize the opportunity to burn the pancakes, and we still need to allow the egg and the cornstarch to cook through.

Ingredients for about 8 pancakes, enough for two hungry people:

1. Two russet potatoes, peeled and grated
2. One egg, whisked
3. One tablespoon of corn starch mixed with a tablespoon or two of cold water
4. Optional: One teaspoon of baking soda
5. A pinch of salt
6. Cooking oil - I prefer extra virgin olive oil

Method:

1. Steam the potatoes in an instant pot (or any handy pressure cooker) for 10 minutes, with natural release.
2. When the potatoes are cold enough to handle, peel them - the skin will come off with ease.
3. Grate the potatoes
1. If you do not have the pressure cooker, grate the peeled raw potatoes, squeeze the grated potatoes in a paper towel to remove the excess moisture
4. Mix all the ingredients in a bowl
5. Heat a large pan with a few TBS of oil on medium
6. When the pan is hot and the oil "dances" in the pan, add the potato mix, about 2 TBS per pancake
7. Wait for the pancakes to set and separate from the pan easily, then lower the heat to medium-low
8. Flip the pancakes periodically, cook until golden and cooked through

For topping:

1. Peel and cut celeriac to small cubes, about 1/5 inch. I used about 1/2 of a large celeriac.
2. Peel 5 or so garlic cloves and cut them into three roughly even-sized pieces.
3. Heat olive oil in a pan, and add celeriac cubes and garlic, and season with a pinch of salt
4. Cook on medium to medium-low until both celeriac and garlic are cooked through, about 15 minutes

Serving:

1. Smear a teaspoon of Dijon mustard on a cooked and warm pancake
2. Top with about 2 TBS ricotta. Spread the ricotta over the pancake.
3. Top with a couple of TBS of cooked celeriac-garlic mixture.
4. If you wish, garnish with some chopped parsley and drizzle with a good olive oil

Hungarian goulash with extra paprika

I grew up just across the border from Hungary, and in general, in Slovenia, Hungarian goulash tends to be a popular not-so-fancy dish. Way back in college, I was expecting friends for a visit, and I told them proudly that I was going to make them goulash. The reaction was polite but but bursting with enthusiasm. Little did they know that I got my hands of a package of venison, and that I was making a special goulash with mushrooms and pieces of bread, no paprika. I still remember the popped eyes when I revealed my humble dish.

Little did I know that with a bit more knowledge and experience one can transform the run-of-the-mill Hungarian goulash into something truly outstanding. I recently made a particularly successful version, failed to take a picture, but it is still worthwhile to record some notes. The picture above shows the chicken drumstick version of goulash. Here are key pieces of insight:

• Use the right kind of meat. Stewing meat works well in the US (get grass-fed if you can), leg of lambs works surprisingly well (but do trim away all that fat), or any tough cut such as beef chuck. I prefer smaller chunks of meat, an inch sized or so.
• Use LOTs of sweet paprika, add smoked paprika, crushed fennel seeds, and some chili flakes to round up the flavor.
• Paprika needs to be gently fried in oil, that transforms the flavor from raw to smooth and deep.
• You need some acidity, and tomato paste does very well in this department.
• A pressure cooker works great, but do not overcook: 20 minutes with natural release seems to be hitting the spot for me.

Ingredients:

• cooking oil
• 1 medium onion, chopped to medium
• 3-5 garlic cloves, minced
• sweet paprika - 3-6 TBS
• smoked paprika - 2-4 TBS
• crushed fennel seeds - 1/2 TBS
• meat - I tend to use one or two 1lb packages of stewing beef we get shipped from Richards Grassfed Beef, or the same amount of leg of lamb
• tomato paste - a small 6oz (170g) can
• water or dashi
• salt, peper, and/or miso to taste
• 1 tsp potato starch (cornstarch is OK) mixed with 1-2 TBS water

Method:

Note: I prefer sauteing in a pan, and using Instant pot just for pressure cooking, I feel I get more control that way. There is no need to share my preferences.

1. In a large pan, e.g. a wok, saute onions with some cooking oil until they soften. Adding a pinch of salt and a few grinds of black pepper speeds up the process and adds a layer of flavor.
2. When the onion is soft, add the spices. Add a bit more oil of the mixture dries out completely. Fry the spices for a minute on a medium heat.
3. Add garlic, saute for 30 seconds.
4. Add the meat that you have already seasoned with salt and pepper. Sautee the meat for a few minutes and stir it around to get it well coated with the spices.
5. Add water or dashi to cover the meat, and the tomato paste and deglaze the pan, mix well to break up the tomato paste.
6. Transfer everything into your pressure cooker.
7. In my 6qt instant pot, I cook goulash for 20 minutes, with natural release.
8. When the pressure has dropped, open the pressure cooker, and add the potato/corn starch mixture. The liquid should be hot enough for the starch to cook. If not, use the saute on medium heat function to thicken the sauce.

Modern take on Slovenian refried potatoes AKA renstan krompir

 "Renstan (or tenstan) krompir" translates as roasted potatoes or better as pot-fried potatoes. I prefer refried potatoes in an homage to refried beans as the basics of the preparation are similar. Just that we go easy on spices - salt and pepper only - and we don't really mash the potatoes. We could play in both areas, but not in this post.

Ingredients:

• Potatoes: 1 medium per person. In Slovenia we would use at least 3 potatoes per person. I prefer Yukon/yellow style waxy potatoes.
• This dish can work very well with russet potatoes, but those need to be steamed whole.
• Onion: 1 per person, or more.
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Salt and optionally pepper

Method:

1. In parallel steam the potatoes and fry the onions so that they are well on their way to caramelization:
2. I start with the onions:
1. Slice onions thinly, or chop them to a small to medium dice. 
2. Add a few TBS of olive oil to your cooking vessel. I prefer my ceramic wok or a carbon steel pal, but really any decent pan will do
3. Heat the oil on medium heat, add the onions and season with a good pinch of salt
4. Stir periodically as the onion soften and start changing the color. Reduce the heat if the onions are burning. Add more oil if the onions are drying out.
3. Prepare potatoes while the onions are cooking:
1. Add a cup of water to the pressure cooker, eg. Instant Pot
2. If you use waxed potatoes
1. Peel and cut potatoes to 1/4 inch cubes, or more traditionally into 1/4 inch slices.
2. Put potatoes into a steaming basket
3. Steam the potatoes under high pressure for 4 minutes. 
4. Use quick pressure release for the potatoes
5. Uncover the pot and take the steaming basket from the Instant Pot
3. If you use russet potatoes:
1. Wash the potatoes and add them, whole, to the steaming basket
2. Steam the potatoes under high pressure for 10 minutes. 
3. Let the pressure drop naturally, or for at least 10 minutes
4. Take the potatoes out of the steaming basket and let them cool sufficiently so that you can handle them by hand easily
5. Peel the potatoes - the skin should mostly just come off - and cut them into 1/4 inch slices
4. When onions are soft and brown, add the potatoes cooked, add the potatoes to the onions.
5. Season with salt to taste, and optionally a little pepper - note that potatoes steamed without salt.
6. On a medium heat, keep frying and folding the potato-onion mixture. 
7. Be patient, after a while the potatoes will start browning and the mixture will start resembling a nicely made potato pancake. 
8. Stop cooking before the mixture starts to burn. You can get the potatoes reasonably crispy and onions even more caramelized, but there is no need to push this too far and burn the dish.

Notes:

As with every traditional recipe there are variations, and everyone knows best what is truly traditional. In this case, variations seem rather limited - one either uses pork fat/cracklings or onions, or both. Our household was of the onion variety, and Jasna's was into cracklings.

In the modern days when common feeding methods reduced omega-3 in pork we tend to avoid pork fat despite the undeniable fact that pork fat rules and that it is tasty. Hence we switched to extra virgin olive oil, which gives the good old refried potatoes a nice flavor kick, while also likely being the healthiest oil to cook with. 

The second variation is how we cook potatoes. Our moms would cook the potato whole, then peel it, and then fry it. Since we discovered the deliciousness of potatoes steamed under pressure in Instant pot, that has been our go-to potato-cooking method.

The cooking vessel for onions and potatoes matters, though one can use pretty much anything if there are no other distractions. That is, the potato-onion mixture takes a while to cook. If I want to use less fat, I resort to my ceramic non-stick wok. With some more fat, a carbon steel or a cast iron pan works well, as well as a stainless steel pan. I tend to go with the wok because it gives me additional safety, and yes I can caramelize onions in that wok very nicely.

Tomato sauce notes

I think making tomato sauce has to be one of the cooking topics that may approach religious beliefs. Hence I have some trepidation to share my notes, though I do want to have the notes recorded, the result has been consistently evoking "WOW!" reactions. 

This is how we make tomato sauce. Notes are added below the recipe.

Ingredients:

• Onion, chopped finely. 
• Optionally: carrots and celery, chopped finely
• Tomatoes, whole, washed. We use organic dry-farmed tomatoes we procure from our CSA farmer.
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Salt.

WHAT, NO QUANTITIES? Yes, that is true. You develop your own preferences. Besides, I never measure. Here is an approximation: For 10 lb tomatoes we would use 1 super large, or two large, or 3 regular size onions. A handful of carrots, and a handful of celery. Two large pinches of salt. Probably 1/3 cup olive oil.

Method:

1. In a food processor, chop up onions finely. Add carrots, and celery if you are using them. 
• Pause a few times and scrape the walls of the food processor. Do not worry if you get a mush, in this case it doesn't matter.
• You can do the chopping by hand if you prefer. If your food processor is too small, do it in batches.
2. Add a good amount of olive oil to a deep pan, heat it at medium high, be careful not to get to a smoking point.
3. Add the mirepoix mixture, stir, add a large pinch of salt, stir again.
4. While the aromatics are softening up, fill up your blender with washed tomatoes. Blend them finely.
• No need to panic when the blended tomatoes get the ugly pink color. They will soon return to the ever so satisfying deep red color.
5. Stir the aromatics periodically until they start turning yellow.
6. Add the blended tomatoes to the pan.
7. Blend more tomatoes, and add them to the pan, until you have used up all the tomatoes that you plan to use.
8. Add another large pinch of salt, stir the sauce.
• The amount of salt is your choice. Remember that simmering will reduce the sauce, so use less salt than what you may think is necessary. Plus, you don't want the salt to overpower the flavor of tomatoes.
9. Bring the sauce to a simmer, and simmer slowly for as short as 30 minutes to as long as you want, we do it for about 3 hours. 
• IMPORTANT: Stir periodically, e.g. at least every 20 minutes or so, depending on your pan and stove. Burned tomato sauce is a giant disappointment. I set an alarm as a reminder every time I stir.
• Lower the heat gradually as the sauce gets thicker. This will minimize splashing, and will also reduce probability of burning the sauce.
• Shorter simmer yields more sauce with a fresher taste
• A long simmer produces a much smaller yield, but a super rich deep flavored thick sauce. We prefer that.
10. Consume it fresh, preserve the rest, share with friends.

Notes

Tomato sauce has uses far beyond pasta dishes and pizza - though those present excellent opportunities for application of the red goodness. Below are a few examples: Flat bread with tomato sauce and sauteed pappers, with a poached egg. Shakshuka takes a new dimension when one uses a really good tomato sauce. Ground beef with padron peppers takes on tanginess and sweetness from tomato sauce. The simplest of all, which I don't even have a picture of, a slice of bread with tomato sauce, roasted garlic, and maybe a touch of mozzarella. Then there are soups and stews...

Clearly, one always needs to have a supply of tomato sauce ready. Should one buy it in a store? Make it from canned tomatoes? Make it from tomato paste? This is what we have chosen, simply because the result beats by a large margin everything we have been able to procure, and because this way we have full control and can use the best ingredients possible.

One may ask whether the choice should be freezing or canning. If you have sufficient freezer space, the question is answered - freeze. The reason is simple - when canning, it is recommended to add a touch of citric acid to prevent botulinum toxins being formed. Which is sad. One works so hard to create sweetness in the tomato sauce, and then takes it down a notch for the sake of safety. We freeze some tomato sauce, but we don't have enough freezer space to freeze it all, so we turn to canning. To be honest, the end result still beats anything we have purchased by a healthy margin.

Blending is a big time saver with no negative effects

Making tomato sauce takes the time as is, but at least while the sauce is simmering, one can do other things, and an alarm can remind you when to stir the sauce. We used to peel tomato skin, deseed the tomatoes, chop them by hand or smash them with a cooking spoon. All of that takes the time and effort and is messy. 

Eventually I gave up and simply threw the whole tomatoes into our blender and gave it a go. The result was a terrifyingly pink tomato liquid  - the picture really does not do the ugliness the justice.

I panicked appropriately, turned to my old friend Google, and quickly learned that there was nothing to worry about. At the sauce cooks, it really does turn into the satisfyingly deep red color. We have a powerful Vitamix blender and run it at the highest speed. That blends the skin properly, and also blends the tomato seeds. The end result is indistinguishable from the method when one peels and seeds the tomatoes - a decisive win for the blender.

We use a ceramic wok!

The slow simmer evaporates the water, and I believe it also caramelizes tomatoes to a point, they become much sweeter. To evaporate the liquid, one needs a vessel with a large surface. We started out by using a roasting pan, and we even tried roasting the sauce in the over for hours and hours, and we also tried using the pan over two burners. It all worked, but the runaway winner is a 14-inch ceramic (non-stick) wok. The shape of the wok maximizes the evaporation surface. The usual carbon steel wok would not like being exposed for hours to a simmering acidic tomato mixture - at best you'd need to reseason the wok. At worst, the tomato sauce may take on some metal taste - I have read about that, thought my experience has been that cooking tomato sauce in a cast-iron pan works just fine. So we turned to ceramic non-stick woks - a 14-inch wok is good for 10lb of tomatoes. They don't burn easily - a huge plus - and the cleanup requires no effort.

We add spices when we use the sauce

We don't add any spices or garlic to the sauce. This way the sauce stays generic and can be used for anything. We add garlic, herbs, or dry spices such as smoked paprika and cumin when we use the sauce. For example, for shakshuka, we fry smoked paprika and cumin on a bit of olive oil, then add the tomato sauce and bring it to the simmer.

If you have a thick sauce, you can dilute it

The sauce we make is quite thick. Not quite tomato paste thick, but much thicker than anything we have ever purchased. This makes it great for a topping for bread, or even with pasta, there is only concentrated flavor.

But sometimes one needs more liquid: Back to the shakshuka example. We like to cook some greens in the tomato sauce, and when we use collard greens, or red-beet greens, or lacinato kale, one needs more liquid to cook the vegetables and not burn the sauce. So we add some water, or dashi, or bean-cooking liquid, any kind of stock, and dilute the sauce enough to get the greens cooked without burning.

What tomatoes to use?

I believe the tomatoes we get are Early Girl, dry farmed. Meaning that the irrigation they get is from the morning mist. Those tomatoes are smaller, and pack an amazing flavor as is. Many recipes recommend using Roma or other plum tomatoes because those tomatoes are less juicy. I'd say get the best tomatoes you are able to buy and you can afford them.

Purchased sauce is cheaper, and inferior

Making your tomato sauce is not necessarily a money saving measure. For us, I think it comes to about $5 per 16 ounce jar just for the ingredients. Admittedly, one can buy tomato sauce for way less money and with way more convenience.