Jennifer Appel grew up on a farm in Washington County where fresh fruits and vegetables were available just outside her kitchen door. “My parents always had a garden,” Appel says. “They also had pear trees and apple trees—it’s just the way I was raised.” So it is no surprise that when it comes to mealtime, Appel chooses to use as many homegrown ingredients as possible.

On this day, the Levant mother of two is mixing up her flavor-filled tomato sauce. She starts by peeling, seeding, and boiling down a half bushel of tomatoes, which she purchased locally from Rowell’s Farm. On another burner, she sautés diced onions and garlic. The intoxicating aroma weakens the knees. “You can’t go wrong with a combination of onion and garlic,” she says. And the greener the olive oil, the better it is, according to Appel, because it tastes more like real olives.

Appel admits her tomato sauce recipe is different than the one her mother passed onto her. For one thing, she says her mother would call this concoction gravy, which is what Italians call their homemade sauce. “Plus, I probably add more vegetables to mine than she does,” Appel says. “I’m not doing that right now, because this is a basic recipe you freeze. You can add those things afterwards when you take it out of the freezer and you’re making pizza or spaghetti.” There is no special packaging needed when freezing homemade tomato sauce. Appel simply uses a gallon-sized Ziploc bag for each batch she makes. “This will last a year,” she says. “If I had a larger freezer, I’d do more.”

As she combines the boiled down tomatoes to her pan of onions and garlic, she catches her youngest daughter out of the corner of her eye getting ready for a school dance. “Julia, you look nice, but you’re not wearing those heels,” she announces while adding fresh basil to the mix. Ever the multitasking mom, she then takes a taste of her sauce, before reaching into her cupboard and grabbing a canister of crushed red pepper, which she sprinkles into the pan. “That’s the thing about following a recipe, you can add to it to make it your own,” she says. After another taste test, her sauce is complete.

Once her pasta is cooked, Appel spreads her homemade sauce (or gravy, depending on your heritage) over it, topping it off with grated Parmesan cheese. “Doesn’t that look good?” she asks with delight as the smell attracts both her children to the kitchen. Rayshell Gagne, Appel’s oldest, says she loves smelling her mom’s cooking throughout the house when she gets home from school. “My favorite is when she has it for spaghetti one night and the rest of it on a pizza another night. It’s the same taste, but it’s completely different,” Rayshell explains.

Appel says her tomato sauce recipe can be used in any Italian dish, including lasagna, cacciatore, spaghetti and meatballs, and pizza. If you were going to eat it right away, Appel recommends sautéing your favorite vegetables and adding them into the sauce before serving. And the same can be done after heating up a bag of frozen homemade tomato sauce. “If I had just taken this sauce that I made today out of the freezer and was making spaghetti sauce with it, I would put in carrots, mushrooms, and green peppers. I like a lot of vegetables,” Appel says. “This actually makes my life so much easier because I have it already prepared and can pull it out of the freezer if I need to make something quick. Plus, I know it’s better for you, and I believe what you put in your body makes a difference in who you are and your behaviors.”

Appel has yet to give her homemade tomato sauce as a gift to friends and family, but says it is something she is contemplating. “It’s an excellent gift for someone, but I’d have to package it differently. Put it in a nice can or jar and run a copy of the recipe on it,” she says.

Besides being a mom, Appel runs a full-time daycare from her home. She says cooking is one thing that relaxes her, yet allows her to take care of her loved ones and those she cares for from the inside out. “I do what I love to do,” she says. “I love to be around children and I love to cook, and I think those go hand in hand. Plus, part of how you care for people is feeding them.”

Homemade Pasta Sauce

Ingredients:

• 3/4 cup olive oil
• 2 medium onions
• 6 cloves of garlic
• 6 cups of peeled and seeded tomatoes
• 8 leaves of fresh basil
• 2 tsp. of salt
• 2 tsp. of pepper
• 2 tsp. of sugar (optional)
• 8 oz. tomato paste
• 1/2 cup of grated Parmesan

Directions:

Sauté onions and garlic in olive oil until soft. Add tomatoes, basil, salt, pepper, and sugar. Simmer 30 minutes, then add paste. Cool 15 minutes and freeze, or cool 15 minutes, add cheese, and serve.