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This is, as advertised, a quick and easy fresh tomato sauce, when the occasion calls for something just that: simple and quickly ready. An evening for two, for example, opening a bottle of Chianti and just deciding what to have, butnot wanting to take too much time, or effort, to get there.

For us, generally, the starting point is having a batch of fresh tomatoes on the window sill, ripe and ready. The rest is easy: olive oil, garlic, basil and salt and pepper. Plus some parmesan and chopped parsley.

Take a pound of fresh, ripe tomatoes, Wash and then roughly cut them in eighths.

Take two cloves of garlic and dice them. Put then in a saute pan with three tablespoons of olive oil. Cook for about ten seconds. Take a half cup of diced onions, or two shallots, diced, and add them to the pan. You can also add a tablespoon or so of diced carrots. Maybe a bit of celery. And some oregano if you  have some fresh. Cook for about four minutes.

Take a half cup or so of fresh basil leaves, torn into little pieces or chopped, and add them to the pan. Cook for twenty seconds.

Add the tomatoes and a half teaspoon of salt. Bring to a boil; and then simmer for ten or fifteen minutes until the tomatoes break up. Cool the mixture and then run it through a food mill. (We much prefer this as an easy way to get to the end result, rather than peeling and seeding the tomatoes).

Add a few grinds of pepper. Taste for seasoning. If the sauce is a little thin, from perhaps too watery tomatoes, cook down for another few minutes.

Add some fresh basil leaves to the mix. Stir. Add the sauce to the spaghetti or whatever pasta you have at the ready and have just cooked al dente. Add a quarter cup of parmesan.

Serve with some more parmesan and perhaps some chopped parsley on the side.

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