Now that tomatoes are in season and therefore cheap, I made this sofrito and also canned it to have its wonderful flavor all year round. It's a sauce itself and paramount ingredient for soups, cooking eggs and casseroles and ragouts (with or without meat).
If you freeze it or you preserve it in jars (like I did), you will save hours and hours in the kitchen chopping and sautéing, and will have the flavor and color of this delicious sauce, which puts "in high heels" any dish, on hand for months. Keep reading below to get my recipe and my step by step how to can it.
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Sofrito
Makes 9 6-ounces jars
__Ingredients
__3 Tbs. of olive oil
1 big yellow onion finely chopped
2 garlic cloves minced
5 pounds (around 2.5 kilos) of finely diced tomatoes
Preparation
1. In a deep sauce pan on medium heat, sauté the onions and garlic until soft, 5 minutes.
2. Add the tomatoes and cook, stirring, until boil, 5 minutes.
3. Reduce the heat, cover and simmer for 20 minutes.
5. Uncover and simmer for 10 more minutes. If the sofrito has too much liquid, you may need to simmer until it reduces to the desired consistency.
Canning
1. Pour the sofrito in sterilized warm 6-ounce jars. Make sure to leave half-inch headspace and that there is no jelly in the headspace (food particles may interfere with sealing).
2. Cap the jars for processing by fitting a screw band snugly over the jar rim and lid.
3. Fill a water bath canner halfway with water. Place the jars in the rack. Make sure the water covers the jars at least by 1 inch.
4. Cover the canner and bring the water to boil. Once the water starts boiling, process for 20-25 minutes.
5. Place the processed jars on kitchen towels. Let them rest until they cool down.
6. The lids will pop and become concave, indicating the jars are sealed.
7. If the lid doesn't pop and doesn't look concave, reprocess the jar with a new lid or refrigerate and eat in the next few days.
8. Canned sofrito should be kept in a dark place up to one year.
For more of my recipes, visit my cooking blog.
Image via Enriqueta Lemoine
