I've made this several times. More recently, I've halved the amount of butter without a discernible difference in flavor. I also add a clove or two of garlic sometimes. And although I discarded the onion the first time I made this, I have opted to use an immersion blender to blend the onion into the sauce every subsequent time.

I've always wanted to try this but never remember this until after the fact. This is our meatless Monday meal tonight so was going to do pasta anyway-I may be making just this sauce.

I can't say enough good things about this recipe! Quick, simple and delicious. Sometimes I only make half, using a can of 14oz tomatoes, etc. Leftovers also work as a pizza sauce.

I have tried this - or at least Molly at orangette's version, via Bon Appetit. I liked it, but felt it was too rich with all that butter. I prefer a more simple marinara.

Yes. I love this recipe. Still need good tomatoes, though. Of course!

And yes, like Kristen says above, you can really get away with much less butter. Half, for sure.

This recipe looks good but I think I'll double the butter instead. Take that!

LOVE this recipe. So simple and delicious!
Don't throw the onion away after the sauce is done. The onion is perfectly tender, sweet and melts-in-your-mouth good!

This is my go-to tomato sauce. Most of the time I make it as per the original version, but sometimes I'll add garlic, herbs or chilies. I think of it as the little black dress of tomato sauces - simple, sophisticated and versatile.

I'm with Kristen - I would need to add garlic. I just can't have anything Italian without it.

Come to think of it, there aren't many foods that I don't add some form of garlic too...

I have tried it, and was unimpressed. I guess the tomatoes were not up to the task.

This sauce saves my life when I get home late from work. No need to think or chop or do much of anything other than enjoy the smell as it simmers. Sometimes I go all out and add a parmigiano rind or a half of a carrot for subtle sweetness. I can't bear to part with the simmered onion either, so I often hit the sauce with an immersion blender for just a second if I want an oniony addition to that pure tomato goodness.

I've made this sauce! It's really good. I should do it far more often.

I love this sauce. And as much as I love pasta, I prefer this sauce with gnocchi. The butteriness of it goes great with them.

I've tried it and it's GOOD. Would definitely recommend it.

I've been making this regularly for a few years and I love it! So good and so easy to throw together on a weekday. It has become a staple in our house... but I will say that it doesn't age very well - next-day leftovers are fine but past that, it gets grainy. Luckily it's so good (and the recipe isn't scaled very large), so leftovers aren't usually a problem! And I agree that reducing the butter by a tablespoon or two doesn't hurt the flavor at all.

I make this all the time, but always add garlic and red chili flakes. It is kind of bland without some spice, in my opinion.

I always end up adding a bit of agave or honey. I love this recipe so much.

I love this sauce as well and used to make it a lot. Somewhere along the way I added a clove of garlic, diced the onion, and started using 2 TBS of olive oil plus 1 TBS butter...I guess it's not Marcella's anymore but it is delicious.

my family has a crazy sauce that i've seen being made and tasted but never tried it and don't know the exact proportions.
butter, tomato paste, tons of chopped garlic, and possibly water? simmer for a long time. it's thin so you eat it spooned over fresh raviolis that you spend lots of time rolling and cutting. mmm...

Okay, I made this last night and while it was good, it wasn't great. I used Muir Glenn tomatoes as thats the brand I had in my pantry but think that the type of tomatoes makes a HUGE difference when employing such a simple preparation. If I had a can of San Marzanos, I would have used that and think it would have been that much better. But, like one of the others, I did eat the onion afterwards. Delicious.

I usually double the recipe, add garlic and simmer for an hour or more. If I had an immersion blender, I'd try the trick above, to blend it all through. If you use a potato masher a few time, throughout cooking, it helps break down any stubborn tomatoes.

I've tried doing it with fresh tomatoes, but it was an awful lot of work for very little final product. Tasty, though.

Next time, leave the onion in. It's the best part and our kids fight for who gets the biggest piece!

How about olive oil instead of the butter? Makes it vegan and super healthy (with a big flavor punch I bet)

I've tried it, and it was a solid sauce recipe but not my all-time personal favorite, I didn't discard the onion but transferred it to the soup stock pot (all my trimmings go in the stockpot).

My favorite sauce uses the following changes from this recipe: replace the butter with half the amount of olive oil, add a splash of balsamic and a pinch of sugar, add half a clove of roast garlic.

Anyone have a good low calories but yet flavoful pasta sauce recipe?

Stick 5 tblspns of butter in anything and it'll taste good, but the calories must be horrific! Surely this is a bit of a "doh" recipe??

It's simmering on the stovetop now - Can't wait to taste it!

This sauce is nice, but maybe overrated? It was really easy and definitely creamy with all the butter. I paired it with an egg papardelle which I don't think stood up to all the creaminess. Maybe next time I would try it with whole wheat pasta.

had this tonight over spaghetti squash. perfect in with the fall, out with the summer dish. doctored it up a bit with fresh oregano, just because i had it on hand, and a sprinkle a red pepper flakes, because, well....why not?? very simple, even as not necessarily a recipe but a technique. appreciated the idea of gaining an entire cooked onion from this....LOVE. zested a tiny bit of lemon in at the end...magnifico~~~

This always turns out a little thin as a sauce for me, but it makes a fabulous soup if you blend everything (onion included) with an immersion blender.

If it comes out thin,I would think you'd cook it longer with the lid off of course!

why do you throw the onion away? why can you not chop it up and add it to the sauce? waste to throw away

for those complaining about the amount of butter, adjust it. but really, this serves 2-4. if you go with the 4 servings that is only a little more than 1T butter per serving. not exactly swimming in oil.

sounds great, and i love the simplicity of ingredients and preparation. and it also sounds endlessly adaptable! awesome template for red sauce!

I make this sauce all the time! But I use good quality olive oil instead of butter. Butter would certainly work. The key is buy Italian plum tomatoes - they are more flesher and taste way better! Depending on the type of pasta and other additions I may add some lightly sauteed garlic and/or fresh basil. As as stand alone this sauce is great with cheese stuffed pasta or seafood with pasta.

hmmm. this should have been a million times easier than my regular sauce but for some reason I don't understand....do you strain the canned plum tomatoes, or toss in the liquid as well?

I can't believe this sauce is so good. I made it exactly as directed (well, actually I threw everything into a cold pot and turned on the fire) and I'm very pleased with the resulted.

I didn't think it was even going to come together correctly -- seemed too watery with the tomato liquid. I kept tasting it, wanting to add something extra to it. But I resisted, only mashing the tomatoes with a potato masher about halfway through, then the onion when the sauce was done cooking.

I took my final taste as I was reaching in my spice cabinet getting ready to doctor it up, but it registered in my head that the sauce was perfect as is. It reminded me of a cross between a chunky tomato soup and a tomato/vodka sauce. It has a velvety texture, and is very simple and subtle. This sauce made me appreciate the taste of tomatoes. Adding other ingredients will probably make a very good sauce, but it not be one that celebrates tomatoes as well, in my opinion. It is equally good with or without Parmesan cheese to me (I ran out between servings).

As far as the butter and concerns about calories -- olive oil has more calories than butter. 1T of butter only has 103 calories in it -- it won't break most diets. Olive oil, which unlike butter is cholesterol-free, comes in at 119 calories per tablespoon. Look it up.

This is Italian comfort food for sure. Extra sauce is great spread on a piece of good toast with a poached egg on top. Sometimes I mix in petite green peas and serve it with small shell pasta for my little children. The sauce is sweet and mellow and they love it.

I've been making this sauce for about 5 years. It's perfect with sausages and peppers/onions, as well as a great base in other recipes, since I always seem to have a couple of cups leftover. I do use twice the amount of tomatoes and 4 T of butter. It's not as rich, but we really enjoy it.

Lucy Waverman has a similar sauce, with olive oil instead of butter and a bay leaf. I almost always double it, and if I've got time, I roast tomatoes and throw that in as well.

Just made it with 1 large onion, 3 tablespoons of butter, 3 cloves of garlic, 1 can of tomatoes, salt, and it was divine. I ended up putting it in the blender because I was hungry and I couldn't smash the tomatoes enough to make it the consistency that I wanted it (i.e. like in the picture). I put most of the onion in the blender, but saved some to be chopped up and tossed with the pasta. It was SO GOOD. I had no idea tomato sauce could be that simple! Definitely going to be making that again!

Marcella's sauce is on my to-do list this weekend. Do you drain the tomatoes before adding them to the pot? Has anyone tried the recipe with a can of crushed tomatoes?

When I first made this, I wasn't overly impressed, but made it again and something hit! I love this basic sauce. I make it and freeze in small portions for when I just need to have a little pasta for a quick meal.
I don't mash the tomatoes, I use the immersion blender. I have no problem with the butter (I use unsalted & add a 1/4 tsp salt), it's basically cream, and tastes like you added ricotta or some other smooth cheese. I love it over ravioli - oops, now I have to go get some. :-} - and most other pasta.
I still make meat sauce etc, but this is always in the freezer, ready to go.
I think many of the not-so-thrilled may be using this like a lot of Americans do, too much sauce. I just lightly dress my pasta and then toss with freshly grated Romano cheese. Got to go - my taste buds are requesting this NOW.

I'm not sure, of course, but who ever commented that the sauce was too thin may be used to the American standard spaghetti sauce (sold in supermarkets in jars) -- so thick you can stand a spoon up in it. So sweet that your teeth hurt as soon as you open the jar!
Pasta, like every other starch (rice, potatoes) absorbs liquid like a sponge -- especially as it cools. A properly sauced pasta should have a liquid component to it with bits of tender tomato. The taste of the properly-salted pasta should come through the sauce... not be overwhelmed by it. We don't hate pasta so why burry it and obliterate it with a sauce that is too thick. In general, Americans over-saue their pasta. And that doesn't just mean there's too much sauce (which there usually is), but also that the sauces we use are too thick and too intense so that they overwhelm everthing they cover. You want a sauce to compliment the food; not overwhelm it.
In most cooking we try to concentrate flavor by reducing sauces (removing water to concentrate flavor). However there are times when more water is needed to properly appreciate all the flavor components (coffee that is too strong does NOT taste better, and somtimes adding water improves the brew because it allows you to taste more of the huge number of flavor components in coffee.) Concentrating flavors is absolutely unnecessary with good tomatoes. Tomato water, which is a byproduct of peeling and deseeding fresh, uncooked tomatoes, is clear in color but tastes intensely of tomatoes (you want to use good tomatoes in such a simple recipe of course -- San Marzano). Cooking without a cover will concentrate it a bit, and that's all you want. Also for textural reasons, you want fluidity -- the pasta screams out for a loose sauce. And as the pasta cools (which it will do even if you preheat the plates), it will absorb the sauce and take on the flavor. Pasta CANNOT absorb flavor from a thick, bright-red, gloppy, sweet sauce that you get in jars at the supermarket. Yet these supermarket products have ruined the American palet. The food industry has fooled the public by re-inforcing the myth that a really good sauce will look bright red, and be thick, super-sweet and rich. This is all completely wrong. They appeal to the eye, but the eye is often wrong especially when it has been conditioned by food industry interests -- it's easier and cheaper for them to get food to look good than it is for them to make it taste right.
I will grant you that some jarred tomato sauces are so tasty that you want to eat them right from the jar with a spoon. BUT, if you put that gloppy sauce on pasta or on any food, it will completely cover up the food. That is not what you want.
Sorry to go on so long, but this is a pet pieve of mine -- obviously! Try using a sauce that is much more loose than you have become accustomed to and I think that over time, you will appreciate a totally different type of tomato sauce and never go back to gloppy again.
One last point -- if you add some of the salty, starchy pasta cooking liquid to the pasta and sauce, the starch in that water will add a tiny bit of thickening so that the sauce clings a bit more to the pasta. The effect is greater as the pasta cools while surrounded by the sauce. Pasta waits for no man, and changes quickly as it cools absorbing any liquid around it. It's really a dramatic effect and not at all subtle.

Robert chef - well said. I couldn't agree more.

This has been my stand-by sauce for years now. It's absolutely amazing and simple, and perfect for my husband, who likes the flavor of onions but hates the bits. Not strong and sweet and sticky, but bursting with gorgeous bright tomatoey flavor and just a hint of creaminess. Sometimes I throw some torn basil and/or shaved parmigiano on top, sometimes I just ladle some over a plate of meatballs (no pasta needed!), sometimes I add pepper or a pinch of dried chili flakes... but always, at the heart, it comes down to these four ingredients. Perfection.