Tomato, Vegetable and Mushroom Ragu
The perfect recipe for Tomato, Vegetable and Mushroom Ragu – made with lots of vegetables and mushrooms to create a thick and hearty tomato sauce. This ragu is perfect to serve with pasta, add to lasagna and many other recipes. It’s very convenient to make a huge batch and freeze it to use in the future.
- Prep Time: 20 mins
- Cook Time: 1 hour 30 mins
- Total Time: 1 hour 50 mins
- Yield: 8 cups 1x
- Category: Miscellaneous
Ingredients
Scale
- 1 Tablespoon oil
- 1 large onion, finely chopped
- 1 celery stalk, minced
- 1 carrot, finely shredded
- 4–6 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 medium zucchini, shredded
- 8 oz. fresh mushrooms, finely chopped
- 28 oz. can crushed tomatoes
- 28 oz can tomato puree or tomato sauce
- salt, ground black pepper, to taste
- 1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
- 1/2 Tablespoons dry herbs (Italian seasoning, etc.)
- 1/4 cup heavy cream, optional
- 1 Tablespoon fresh herbs, finely minced (parsley, basil, oregano, etc)
Instructions
- Heat the oil in a heavy-bottomed pot or a dutch oven. Add the onions, celery, carrots, and garlic. Season to taste with salt and ground black pepper. Cook on medium heat for about 5 minutes, until the vegetables are softened. Add the zucchini and the mushrooms. Season again with salt and ground black pepper. Turn the heat up to medium-high. As the zucchini and mushrooms cook, they will exude a significant amount of liquid at first. Keep cooking all the vegetables until all the liquid is absorbed and the veggies and mushrooms start to turn
- Add the zucchini and the mushrooms. Season again with salt and ground black pepper. Turn the heat up to medium-high. As the zucchini and mushrooms cook, they will exude a significant amount of liquid at first. Keep cooking all the vegetables until all the liquid is absorbed and the veggies and mushrooms start to turn
- As the zucchini and mushrooms cook, they will exude a significant amount of liquid at first. Keep cooking all the vegetables until all the liquid is absorbed and the veggies and mushrooms start to turn golden 8-10 minutes.
- Pour the crushed tomatoes and the tomato sauce. Bring it to a boil and then reduce to a simmer. Season the sauce with salt, ground black pepper, dry herbs, and sugar. The sugar will even out the acidity of the tomatoes and give the sauce a smoother flavor. Trust me on this one, just a bit of that sugar will not make the sauce sweet, it will even out the flavor. Simmer at a low-medium heat for 45 minutes to an hour or so.
- If you have any parmesan rinds, you can add them to the sauce. They will give the sauce an extra boost of flavor and this is a great way to put to good use something that you might otherwise throw out.
- If the sauce is too thick, add a cup of water.
- At the very end, taste the sauce again and adjust the salt and other seasonings. Pour in the heavy cream and the fresh herbs. The cream is completely optional. Store in the refrigerator or freezer. You can freeze this sauce from 6 months to a year, although it’s never lasted that long at our house.