7 things you didn’t know about Italian tomato sauce
Between 1880 and 1924, more than 4 million Italian emigrants stepped off the boat in America. They brought their secret weapon with them: the recipe for tomato sauce just like Mama makes it. Did you know this about Italian tomato sauce?
Every year, 5.5 million tonnes of tomatoes are produced in Italy.
The average American eats 9 kilos of pasta per year. By comparison, the average Italian eats 24 kilos of pasta.
Tomatoes originally come from South America. In 1540, world traveller Hernán Cort´s brought the first tomatoes to Europe.
Italian tomato sauce probably dates back to the sixteenth century, when people were already cooking on merchant ships with the tomatoes transported from South America to Naples. The sailors made Pasta Marinara on board—sailors’ pasta.
The first recipe for tomato sauce was recorded by the Italian cook Antonio Latini in 1692. The most popular cookbook in Italy at the moment: La Scienza in cucina e l’Arte di mangiar bene, the science of cooking and the art of eating well. It was first published in 1891 by the writer Pellegrino Artusi himself, because he couldn’t find a publisher.
That Italian restaurant with a red-and-white checked tablecloth and Chianti bottles hanging from the ceiling? Typically American. In 1920, these ‘red sauce restaurants’ became hugely popular. Not only because of the sauce, but also because they served alcohol during Prohibition in the United States.
The first description of pasta dates back to 1154, and people were already eating pizza in the tenth century. The recipe for lasagna dates back to the fourteenth century—and back then it did not yet contain tomato sauce. Pesto probably dates back to Roman times.
Also read:
- How to: decipher an Italian menu
- The trick to a killer tomato sauce
- Passata, pelati and secchi: everything about preserved tomatoes
