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Embarking on a traditional German dish that translates as "sour roast," which requires three days of marinating in vinegar and spices.

When Nick wrote about homemade Italian beef last week, waxing poetic about an obsession "with the idea of turning a lowly and lean cut into something delicious," I understood completely.  At the time, I had my own 4-pound piece of the beef round marinating in my fridge.  It was on its way to becoming Sauerbraten, a well-known dish in Germany that translates as "sour roast."

Beef round is a difficult cut to maneuver into deliciousness.  Like chuck, short ribs, brisket, and other bargains, it is a well-worked muscle (taken from the rear leg of the cow) and therefore tends towards toughness.  But unlike those other cheap cuts, beef round has very little fat.  This makes it harder to keep moist and tender, since its natural state is stringiness.

In the case of Italian beef, Nick's key to tenderizing the cut was very thin slices.  But with sauerbraten, the tenderizing comes from slow braising and a boost from vinegar: after you sear the hell out of the meat, it sits in a clove and juniper berry infused vinegar mixture for three entire days.

It's important to note that the tenderizing properties of vinegar have been greatly exaggerated--though the acidic marinade does help soften things, vinegar ain't gonna turn beef round into filet mignon (plus, it would taste all sour and off). 

But like many persistent kitchen myths, it's based on a kernel of truth--the vinegar does help.  But its real role is flavor. And the real key to fork-tender Sauerbraten is a low, slow braise in the marinade sauce, which melts the chewy connective tissue and creates a beefy roast.  The marinade mellows during cooking, losing its acidic harshness for a subtle sourness that holds the richness of the beef in check.

Though we like to joke about being relatively poor in...

Though we like to joke about being relatively poor in Manhattan, poor now means not being able to buy that $15 bottle of wine twice a week.  But I can remember a time while living in London as a student when every coin was fully accounted for, and being poor meant another night of rice, potatoes, or buttered toast sauteed in a pan because I didn't have a toaster.  After a long shift at work, if I had a few coins jingling around and was feeling particularly saucy, I'd splurge at the 24-hour Tesco across the street on a 99 pence Egg Mayonnaise and Cress Sandwich.  Life was suddenly better.  Maybe it was the late hour, the heavy head not prepared for an hour-long night bus trip home with other mysterious travelers--but I vividly remember those venerable sandwiches.  The creamy egg mayonnaise would balance the crisp and peppery watercress, and I'd begin my long ride home to my flat.

So when our local produce market suddenly had watercress, my mind flickered with nostalgia and I set about recreating the sandwich from top to bottom to suit my inflated memory.

I was recently bumming on a friend's membership to Costco, arms full of inexpensive bulk yeast and Dijon mustard for salad dressing, when I discovered the can of tomatoes you see above. It seemed like the deal of a century. For $3.89, I walked away with a can of San Marzano tomatoes weighing almost 7 pounds. That's the price you sometimes pay for a single 28 oz can of them.

I immediately contemplated the massive pot of tomato sauce that would fill my freezer.  Once you have good tomatoes, the idea is to do as little as possible to screw them up.

Everybody has their own way of making tomato sauce, and for the most part, I'm cool with that. Basic tomato sauce is something personal. I think that there are lots of ways to find yourself with a fine sauce for coating noodles of spaghetti and topping your favorite lasagna.

Personally, I've made a lot of bad tomato sauce in my life. When I was in college, I used to regularly make spaghetti sauce by raiding our communal pantry for whatever tomato products were on hand. Diced tomatoes, whole tomatoes, tomatoes in puree, tomatoes in juice, tomato paste...didn't matter all that much. Mix them together and start the pot heating. Then I'd raid the cabinet for dried spices, and anything that was green might find its way, especially dried basil and oregano. Then I'd simmer it forever, tasting and adding new spices and sometimes condiments, always aiming for some unreachable perfection and never quite getting there.

The problem was, the more I added new spices to the pot, the duller it tasted. The longer it was on the stove, the muddier the flavor. In the end, I usually just gave up and added some ground beef and called it a day.

What does it mean to have a good tomato sauce, that unreachable perfection? I think it needs brightness, acidity, sweetness, and depth. Achieving them in balance is another story. But you know it when you taste it.

Jarred sauce is incredibly popular because it's the ultimate easy dinner and a nice thing to have in the pantry. But man, what a terrible deal. Jarred sauces are more expensive than they should be, and more than that, they never taste quite right to me. But it's tough to deny that having tomato sauce around is nice, and somehow spending a ton of time preparing it is also unappealing. It seems like a cook's basic right.

Which is why this recipe is awesome. All you need to buy is decent canned tomatoes, cook a lot at once, and stash it in the freezer.

Mario Batali, whose recipe I have been using for awhile, has one secret to his sauce that I think makes all the difference. It's grated into the oil at the beginning, and, while cooking, essentially disappears leaving its subtle, vegetal sweetness behind.

That secret is carrot.  For some strange reason, it makes the tomato sauce twice as good. I rounds it out. The result is the tomato sauce I've returned to again and again. All it takes is about 45 minutes, and then your freezer will always have that simple tomato sauce you need. It's stands on its own over pasta, but can transform into many other dishes.  One favorite is Pasta alla Puttanesca, which I wrote about over on Serious Eats awhile back.

It's not rocket science. Hit up a friend at Costco and find these tomatoes, or find another way to buy them in bulk. The result is easy and costs a fraction of what jarred sauce does.

And then, tell me in the comments what your favorite way (or secret ingredient) is to make tomato sauce.