Use Baking Soda to Improve the Taste of Canned Tomatoes
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I love a good tomato sauce over pasta, but I hate the tinned taste that comes from using canned tomatoes. Since fresh tomatoes aren't always a good option depending on the season, I had to come up with a way to make canned tomatoes taste better. And the solution is so simple... just add a little baking soda to reduce the canned taste of your tomatoes!
You remember how as a kid you'd mix baking soda with vinegar, and the result would be a big bubbly mess that you called a volcano? The same principles apply here, and the baking soda will react with the acid in your tomatoes and raise the pH, making it taste less acidic.
Just add a little bit baking soda to your sauce while it's cooking. A hefty pinch or 1/4 teaspoon at a time is all you need, so be sure not to use too much, or it may affect the texture of the tomatoes.
When you stir it in, the sauce will fizz, foam, and bubble as the baking soda reacts with all that extra acid in the tomatoes.
Just keep stirring for a few minutes and soon the bubbles will be gone... along with that canned tomato taste!
10 comments so far:
Hey there,
I was making speghetti and meatballs, and the recipe I used required 2 cans of whole tomatoes. My sauce was not tasting right at all! I tried your tip and it worked like a charm!! Thanks!! You saved my sauce. Whew!
P.S. Though I wonder how unhealthy it is eating baking soda :-S
JS, so glad to hear that this easy tip helped you out! Baking soda is an ingredient used in many recipes and is perfectly safe to eat. Some argue it even has health benefits, but as with anything, it's only effective in moderation :)
This tip was on point!!! Thank you so much, I am so glad I came across this information.
Once the baking soda reacts with the vinegar in the tomatoes the byproduct is salt, so it's safe to use but you may ,and should, add salt after tasting the almost finished product.
Thanks for sharing that tidbit of info with us, Metqa!
HI I am having problems preserving tomato sauce, that has been bottled,later to be used as pasta sauce.We remove the skin from the tomato with machine, that also juices the pulp.once bottled we boil the bottles for aprox 45 minutes,we have opened them later and they have fizzed like a carbonated drink, could u advise me on what i am doing wrong.Aldo
Sorry Aldo, but we don't have any experience with preserving/canning tomato sauce!
You can also grate a whole carrot in your spaghetti sauce, the sweetness from the carrot will take offset the acidic flavor, and, it will also add another vegetable to your spaghetti sauce
Cathy, what a neat trick! I'll have to try that out sometime.
Such a great tip for those who have to buy canned goods!