Tomato sauce for pasta (mirepoix ver.)

Ingredients

• The mirepoix mix - equal portions of:
  • Carrots
  • Celery
  • Onions (preferably Spanish/yellow onions. White onion also works; avoid purple/red onions)
• Tomato paste
• Pandora's spices (choose your own adventure)
  • Italian spice mix
  • Salt
  • Pepper
  • Cinnamon
  • Bay leaf
  • Thyme
  • Parsley
  • Cajun spices
  • Garlic (preferably fresh. The powder also works)
  • Soy sauce
  • MSG (umami glitter)
• Water
• (Optional) Cooking or regular wine - to deglaze the pan
• (Optional) Meat - ground beef or pork works best!
• (Optional) Sauté mushroom (cut themn into thin slices!)

Cooking instructions

1. Dice the mirepoix into small cubes and stir-fry them in a large pan. Stir constantly until they are reduced and pour in water or wine occasionally to deglaze the pan.
2. Once the mixture is soft and started to smell really nice, add in the spices, whatever you choose from the many options above. Stir and keep frying them.
3. Once you feel ready, you can start adding tomato paste. Add in a little water to help dissolve the flavors and make the mixture into a soup-like substance.
4. Keep mixing until boiling on medium-high to high heat.
5. Once that's done close the lid and keep the mixture simmering.
6. Once you feel like the mixture is becoming a soup (i.e., is soft and no longer hard or chewy), use an immersion blender or any kind of blender to blend the mixture into a paste. Keep blending until you achieve a desirable consistency.
7. You can keep pulsing and add in olive oil or butter to add more flavor to the mixture.
8. Once done, if you added too much water, you can put it in a simmer to reduce steam.
9. Once you have reached your desired consistency, you can wait, let it cool, and store them in jars. These should be good for many days.

Reference

Shout out to my buddy Alex who made this sauce once and I applied the improvised cooking framework to make this recipe

I'm writing this at 1:10 AM because Chenyi kept bugging me about this urghhhhhh...