Talk:Tomato sauce

Confusing article

This is a very confusing article. This is perhaps best illustrated by this para:

In the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and India the term "tomato sauce" normally refers to the condiment otherwise known as tomato ketchup, whereas in Canada and the US, "tomato sauce" replaces "marinara sauce" and never refers to ketchup. In these countries, other sauces made with tomatoes are more usually referred to as pasta sauce etc., depending on their uses. In Australia, the term marinara often refers to a tomato-based seafood dish such as spaghetti marinara or marinara pizza.

But the confusion seems to pervade the entire piece.

I agree that in Aust tomato sauce is close to the US ketchup. Then the next part of the sentence is really confusing and it just gets worse and worse. How does "tomato sauce" replace "marinara sauce" in Canada and the US? Confusing. I thought that it was only in the US that marinara refers to a tomato sauce containing no meat and no seafood (called Napolitana in Australia from my experience, as it is in Italy, while it is apparently called Neapolitan sauce in the US). Likewise Australia uses Marinara to refer generally to seafood being contained in the dish, which I thought many countries did with the exception of the US. Asa01 06:41, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

OK I plan a major edit/delete of the confusing elements of this article. I have saved the most confusing section below. Asa01 08:22, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

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Marinara sauce (from Italian alla marinara 'sailor style') is another term for a simple and generally quickly made tomato sauce for pasta made without meat and usually including tomatoes, onions and herbs. This usage of the term is confined to the United States, while in Italy it refers to seafood sauces for pasta, risotto, or pizza (with or without tomato sauce). Marinara sauce is spicy, often made with large amounts of garlic and chile pepper, but not to the degree of Fra Diavolo sauce. It can be used for any dish that requires tomato sauce, and is generally quicker to prepare than other tomato sauces. It is often used as a dipping sauce for foods such as calzone and fried mozzarella sticks.

Other common regional Italian tomato sauces include Amatriciana (diced tomatoes and pancetta), Arrabbiata (chile pepper), Vodka sauce (vodka and cream), Salsa Cruda (raw tomatoes), and Puttanesca (olives, garlic, anchovies). Most of these well-known sauces are typical of Roman and Neapolitan cuisine. Tomato sauce and pasta (much like olive oil) were rarely consumed in the North of Italy until they became increasingly available, beginning in the 1960s.

In the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and India the term "tomato sauce" normally refers to the condiment otherwise known as tomato ketchup, whereas in Canada and the US, "tomato sauce" replaces "marinara sauce" and never refers to ketchup. In these countries, other sauces made with tomatoes are more usually referred to as pasta sauce etc., depending on their uses. In Australia, the term marinara often refers to a tomato-based seafood dish such as spaghetti marinara or marinara pizza.

Some Italian Americans use the term "gravy" to refer to tomato sauce, especially a tomato sauce with meat. "Sunday gravy" is a common type of long-simmered tomato sauce containing meat (often pork or meatballs; similar to an Italian Neapolitan ragù) that is often identified with Italian-American home cooking. It is generally served over pasta. Others just use the term "sauce" to refer to tomato sauce.

Pizza sauce generally refers to a thick, smooth sauce used as a pizza topping. It is similar to but not identical with a marinara sauce, and they are not considered interchangeable. It is, however, not universal; some pizza styles prefer a topping made of sliced, diced, or ground tomatoes with minimal seasoning.

Escoffier included a tomato sauce recipe using salt pork, butter, and a liaison of wheat flour as one of the mother sauces in his master work, Le Guide Culinaire, but it is not commonly used in French cuisine.

Tomato sauce is also used to some extent in Greek cuisine; it is commonly long-simmered and generally spiced with cinnamon and other typical Greek spices. Tomato sauce is also common in Filipino cuisine, where it is almost universally preferred sweet.

Missing citations and poor references - also the 'Ketchup' conversation.

Fourth paragraph quote: "In countries such as Britain, Australia, New Zealand and in Southern Africa the term 'tomato sauce' is used to describe a condiment similar to that known in the USA as 'ketchup'.[1]"

However the reference is to http://journals.worldnomads.com/leah/gallery/13544/384186.aspx - which is a picture of a meat pie with sauce and a caption. Maybe an example, but hardly a reference and much has been added by the wikipedia author. Maybe this section should be removed.

There is an opening blurb that says: This article is about the sauces often used with pasta or pizza. In some countries, "tomato sauce" means ketchup. And part of the first paragraph reads: A tomato sauce is any of a very large number of sauces made primarily out of tomatoes, usually to be served as part of a dish (rather than as a condiment). Then lower down, there is a section on tomato sauce in Australia which says that it commonly refers to a sauce similar to American ketchup.

What I'm trying to illustrate here is that the first two statements contradict the Australian tomato sauce section, can't be referenced and I think the first needs to be removed and the second tidied up. Australian tomato sauce is still a tomato sauce, and fits the generalised description. No references can be given to support the former statements, and what an "average" Australian considers to be tomato sauce is covered by the article.

Further, it is improper to forward readers to "Ketchup" when they're looking for Australian (or non-American English-speaking world) tomato sauce. Ketchup is not the same as the type of tomato sauce. (Maybe ketchup itself should be referenced in the US section.) Belfry (talk) 11:17, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Mexican sauce

"Tomato sauce was an ancient condiment in Aztec food" ??? Reference please! "Tomato (not souce) was an ancient ingrediente in Aztec food" perhaps...--Schellenberg (talk) 20:33, 3 April 2016 (UTC)

Florentine Codex. This was linked previously. The translation is sound, or feel free to find someone to translate it from Spanish for your edification Here is an essay on the subject from Oxford http://oxfordre.com/latinamericanhistory/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780199366439.001.0001/acrefore-9780199366439-e-655

Commonwealth

I live in the UK, and I have never used the term "tomato sauce" used for anything other than a fresh pasta sauce, nor heard it used that way. Calling ketchup "tomato sauce" is entirely absurd to me. I'm not sure about the other Commonwealth countries. Can we get some citations to support the claim that "tomato sauce" refers to something akin/identical to ketchup? Otherwise the section ought to be removed.--Newbiepedian (talk · contribs · X! · logs) 16:45, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

In South Wales ketchup is written on labels, but no-one calls it that. Red sauce or tomato sauce. Stub Mandrel (talk) 15:09, 20 March 2022 (UTC)

I also lived in the UK until recently (birth to early thirties) and I can confirm tomato-sauce is used for ketchup, at least in the areas I've lived; Hampshire and Midlands. It caught me out at first now I live in San Francisco. --rhs98 (talk · contribs · X! · logs) 10:09, 21 January 2017 (UTC)

In Australia, tomato sauce (which my father referred to as "dead horse") usually comes out of squeeze bottle, goes on pies, sausage rolls, and at barbies etc. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.171.80.2 (talk) 01:51, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

I'm from Yorkshire and most people here would first think of ketchup after hearing tomato sauce and usually a mixture of the two is used. People are more likely to call a tomato sauce made for pasta 'pasta sauce', although on menus dishes would be referred to as being 'with a tomato sauce'.

I'm from the Midlands. I grew up calling "ketchup" tomato sauce, as did my parents, who were born before WW2, and their parents, who were born before ww1. Mind you, neither them saw pasta sauce outside italy until the 1970s and so they would not have had a need to call anything else by the name "tomato sauce". Even in the 80's, we probably just called it "dolmio" after the leading brand of the time.151.170.240.200 (talk) 08:20, 15 July 2021 (UTC)

@Newbiepedian We have always called Ketchup "Tomato Sauce" and ketchup by contrast is never used. I've lived all across the UK, and heard both. Why is this still disputed? 81.174.170.144 (talk) 18:13, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

Just the facts, people. Mexico is the country of origin for Tomato Sauce.

Been seeing a lot of revisions, probably well intentioned, that implies Italy was the country of origin for tomato sauce, which is proven incorrect by a simple glance at the Florentine Codex. In it, Fray Bernardo describes a tomato sauce with the primary ingredients (presumably tomatoes, chilis, and salt in a stew) primarily found in Italian cookbooks several hundred years later. Let us not rewrite history. It would be more correct to create a wiki specific to the tyoes of tomatoes sauces that arose in Italy 200 years after its discovery in the new world.

Where is it in the history prose? Only the Itaian version can be found with no mention of Aztec origins. Vaselineeeeeeee^★★★ 12:05, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

There needs no correlation between a cookbook mentioning a previous incantation of the object for the latter to have existed. As we know, there are myriad examples of different cultures developing the same style of cuisine. Only that here: 1) we have already established that the Florentine Codex, as also described in the Oxford article link (re-added here http://oxfordre.com/latinamericanhistory/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780199366439.001.0001/acrefore-9780199366439-e-655) establishes without probable doubt that Tomato sauce as we know it (meaning combined with peppers like bell peppers and tomatoes in a stew, in an area where salt and onions were already available) was already in markets of Tenochtitlan, and 2) all the ingredients for making what Italians would eventually cite as needed for a tomato sauce were all available and in use in Mesoamerican cuisine.

I believe the contention here is on the term “Tomato Sauce” as has been popularized in the US to mean an Italian version of it. However, “tomato sauce” is already heavily marketed in the US and other countries as simple liquid tomato. “Pasta sauce” and its variations are well established as a separate creation altogether, vis a vis in grocery stores.

I understand that this page has some Italian history tagging, but the product is simply no more Italian than polenta, in that these were already in the new world and have a simple name change. One needs look no further than to remember when anyone asks for a “xerox” or “kleenex” when they only mean the utilitarian understanding of it and not the literal product.

The utilitarian description of “tomato sauce” is simply that: the most basic of sauces. No need to convolute it with being interchangeable with, say, marinara or arriabata sauce, as they serve no other purpose outside of showing a further iteration of the original.

Under the french section we have also established that tomato sauce in s a mother sauce, yet it has no resemblance to pasta sauce; It’s simply a rehashing of the original mexican tomato sauce.

“Where is it in the history prose?” The first western person to write of what may have been a tomato sauce was Bernardino de Sahagún, a Franciscan friar, who made note of a prepared sauce that was offered for sale in the markets of Tenochtitlan (Mexico City today). Of this he wrote (translated from Spanish), They sell some stews made of peppers and tomatoes — usually put in them peppers, pumpkin seeds, tomatoes, green peppers and fat tomatoes and other things that make tasty stews.[4] — Florentine Codex (1540-1585)

Btw this was already included on the wiki under Mexico

Under Description in the wiki, we have already written: “The simplest tomato sauce consists just of chopped tomatoes cooked down (possibly with olive oil) and simmered until it loses its raw flavor. Of course, it may be seasoned with salt, or other herbs or spices.”

With Wikipedia’s own accepted understanding of tomato sauce as cited above (the simplest of tomato sauce consists of just chopped tomatoes cooked down), that excludes Italian sauces from being the origin of tomato sauce, as again, this sauce was already in use in Mexican cuisine for entomatado foods.

This information should be reflected right away in the History section; I've done so. Vaselineeeeeeee^★★★ 22:27, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

IMUH you don't know the difference between sauce and soup --Schellenberg (talk) 15:14, 7 May 2019 (UTC)