recipe: tomato basil sauce

so... somehow we ended up with three 6 lb, 10 oz cans of pureed tomatoes. largest cans i have ever seen in my life. i've been meaning to make sauce for some time now, but the 'time' aspect of that is what has messed me up. today was finally the day. i looked at the Tomato and Basil Sauce recipe from allrecipes.com as loose inspiration with a few tweaks here & there... the end result was really good - actually more flavor that i expected (the Italian half of me us usually pretty bad - i rarely eat red sauce b/c it's "boring"... opting for cream sauces & vodka sauces instead...or just curry haha). i made it pretty spicy, but the amount of red pepper can easily be adjusted for personal pref.

ingredients list (servings: unknown. this is a ton of sauce): 

- 1 onion, finely diced

- 8 gloves of garlic, minced

- 4 tbsp of olive oil

- 1 tbsp of garlic oil (if available - i had snagged this from the Asian market & it seemed like a  good fit here)

- 2-3 tbsp of balsamic vinegar

- 1 (6 lb, 10 oz) can of pureed tomatoes

- 2 tbsp white sugar

- 1 tsp oregano

- 1 tbsp italian seasoning 

- 1 tbsp crushed red pepper

- salt & fresh cracked black pepper to taste

- 1 bay leaf

- 1.5 cups fresh chopped basil

to make: heat olive and oils in large pot; add onion until it's soft. add garlic to onion and cook for 1 additional minute. add 

balsamic vinegar & allow to cook down for 1 minute. 

add pureed tomatoes, white sugar, oregano, italian seasoning, red pepper, salt & pepper to taste, and the bay leaf. allow sauce to come to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and simmer for 1 - 1.5 hours. 

remove from heat, remove bay leaf, and stir in basil. done!