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Several Chowhounds roast their tomato sauce for pasta. “Roasting concentrates the flavors and enhances the sugar content of fruits and veggies,” explains Kelli2006.
Boccone Dolce recommends throwing the cooked sauce into a big roasting pan, and then into a hot oven for a while. “It’s goooood.” geminigirl roasts tomatoes with other summer veggies tossed with olive oil, salt, and pepper until they’re soft; then puts them all in a blender to make a sauce. Once the vegetables are roasted, you don’t notice their skins, so she doesn’t bother peeling them beforehand. But Cookiefiend finds it’s easy to pluck off the tomatoes’ skins once they’re roasted, if you prefer your tomatoes peeled. She browns meatballs, deglazes the pan, and adds the roasted sauce to simmer with the meatballs.
Board Link: Why does roasting make everything taste better?
If you go to the the Alton Brown Fan site there was a whole show done on roasting tomato sauces. I take it a step further, each year I take my tomatoes (typically 2 or 3 bushels) out to my smoker grill, sliced longitudinally with cut side up on a stainless steel baking sheet. I spray a tiny bit of good olive oil on the cut surface of each half and let the tray full smoke (NOT directly over...+READ
If you go to the the Alton Brown Fan site there was a whole show done on roasting tomato sauces. I take it a step further, each year I take my tomatoes (typically 2 or 3 bushels) out to my smoker grill, sliced longitudinally with cut side up on a stainless steel baking sheet. I spray a tiny bit of good olive oil on the cut surface of each half and let the tray full smoke (NOT directly over flames) for about 6 minutes until the tops begin to show a smoked coloration. It takes some experimentation, some people like a smokier flavour that others do.
Naturally some juice is rendered out of the halves and is in the bottom of the sheet pan. I reserve that for later.
Then when all the tray fulls are done I take the lot inside and put the halves back on a tray and sprinkle some sea salt or kosher salt on the tops and a small amount of freshly ground pepper (a blend of white, green and black) on top of the partially cooked halves and slide them into the broiler till some Mailliard reaction shows. Once again there is liquid produced which I pour off in with the previous 'run-off' from the grill and I take the total liquid and reduce it down to one third volume along with some torn up basil, and parsley stems. (the stems of the parsley have.more of the flavour than the leaves do).
Once the halves have cooled I cut them into quarter sized pieces, add them to the reduced liquid, and then I add either some white wine or some Graham's 6-grape port and a tiny bit of balsamic vinegar. Tomatoes have flavour compounds that do not release with water, only with alcohol.
The final cooled product? I put in quart bags, and use it for Spanish, or Italian dishes having not put any cuisine specific herbs in it ... and freeze them. I'll be running out in another couple of weeks -snicker- and I'll have to do my annual effort again soon.-COLLAPSE