Slow Cooker Summer Pasta Sauce with Fresh Basil

By Kathy_Hester

The perfect way to not heat up your kitchen and have a from scratch pasta sauce too! Fresh tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, and herbs come together to create this mouthful of summer.

For the fresh tomatoes it’s best to use Italian since they are meatier and not as juicy. If you use regular tomatoes seed them or be prepared to cook your sauce down longer than 8 hours. You can also seed the Italian ones to make a thicker sauce.

Ingredients

• 1 to 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/2 cup onion, minced (about 1/2 a medium onion)
• 1/2 cup sweet or bell pepper, minced (about 1/2 a medium bell pepper)
• 2 cups (164 g) eggplant, diced
• 2 1/2 to 3 cups (395 to 474 g) diced fresh Italian tomatoes (of any color)
• 3 cups diced tomatoes, or 2 cans (around 14 ounces or 392 g each)
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano (or 1 tablespoon fresh)
• Fresh ground pepper and salt to taste
• 1/4 cup (10 g) fresh basil, chopped

Details

Servings 8
Preparation time 20mins
Cooking time 400mins
Adapted from healthyslowcooking.com

Preparation

Step 1

The night before: Chop the veggies. Heat the oil and sauté the onion and pepper until translucent. Store the onion mixture and together with the diced tomatoes and eggplant in the same covered bowl in the fridge overnight.

In the morning: Combine all the ingredients (except for fresh basil) in your slow cooker and cook all day on low (or 4 hours on high). Season to taste with salt, pepper, and then stir in the chopped fresh basil. Serve over pasta. (Whole wheat angel hair is my favorite.)

You can also purée the sauce with an immersion blender for really picky eaters or for an extra thick sauce.

You can freeze the leftovers for another meal later in the month. (Or make extra pasta and use the leftover for lunches instead.)

When you come home you may need to add extra water if the sauce is too thick. If it is too thin put the handle of a wooden spoon between the lid and the crock then turn it to high. This should help the extra liquid to evaporate. If it is really watery, transfer it to a pot and cook on the stove without a lid to reduce it faster.