Chocolate Chips, Cinnamon, And 27 Other Veryyyyy Uncommon Pasta Sauce Add-Ins That Will Have Your Guests Begging For Your Secret

Tweaking a reddish condiment is simply a batch similar sizing up a edifice the infinitesimal you locomotion done the door: Every navigator has a quiescent checklist. Maybe it’s the extent of color, that archetypal deed of ail successful the steam, oregon however good the condiment coats the backmost of a spoon. A azygous other constituent tin extremity the full acquisition from “fine” to “tell maine your secret.” That’s wherever today’s database comes in.

Redditor LittleBlueStumpers precocious posed a elemental question to the r/Cooking community, asking them to share “the 1 ingredient” that makes their spaghetti condiment better. The thread blew up with classics similar reddish vino and oregano, and curveballs similar miso and semi‑sweet cocoa chips. I sifted done the responses and pulled the astir intriguing picks to effort the adjacent clip your marinara needs a small thing extra.

1. "A spoon of baking soda. I saw this extremity connected a TikTok video by an Italian woman sharing her pasta sauce. She said it raises the pH, removes the acidity, and makes the condiment a spot sweeter without sugar. I've tried it a fewer times, and it works. You'll cognize it's moving erstwhile the liquid gets a spot frothy, but that dissipates."

3. "Bouillon powder, guys: it has MSG and ribonucleotides moving successful synergy and boosting umami acold much efficiently than axenic MSG alone. It's been everyone's "secret ingredient" for decades, but cipher bothered speechmaking the ingredients to announcement MSG was a component."

4. "An umami booster to boost the meatiness of the tomatoes. I similar Worcestershire sauce. Others volition accidental food condiment oregon anchovies — each sources of umami."

—Childermass13

"Fish condiment is my go-to, but I’ve utilized these before. I’ve besides utilized marmite (I’m decidedly a marmite hater, but successful cooking it’s different) and mushroom pulverization (ground up my ain stash)."

—wildOldcheesecake

5. "Do yourself a favour and way down immoderate colatura. It’s the Italian mentation of food sauce."

6. "My Italian mother-in-law's condiment is ever great, and excavation ne'er rather matches up. I asked for her look and got a beauteous basal database of ingredients and process, thing retired of the mean from what I was doing. Then 1 day, aft defrosting her condiment (she utilized to nonstop america frozen batches), I recovered immoderate nutrient successful it. I asked and she said, 'Oh, that's conscionable immoderate braciole oregon pork chop.' It turns retired she adds immoderate benignant of leftover nutrient to simmer successful the pot, which adds a batch of flavor, but someway that didn't marque it into the recipe. Thinking back, her ma and sister ever had sausages oregon meatballs successful the condiment that were removed earlier serving the sauce, but I'm definite it benefited from the fats and nutrient juices."

—joeymac09

7. "Toasted fennel seeds marque it sensation similar determination is Italian sausage successful it. I had a vegetarian person who couldn't judge determination wasn't immoderate nutrient successful it."

9. "A tiny rind of parmesan thrown in."

10. "Melt a small food into astir immoderate condiment astatine the end."

—Jeithorpe

"This is wherefore I emotion truthful galore Cambodian and Vietnamese sauces: classical East Asian preparations with food added to the condiment astatine the end. It reflects the French power connected Southeast Asian cuisine."

—StatusAfternoon1738

11. "Don't skimp connected the ingredients; usage San Marzano tomatoes."

12. "I similar to support a spot of reddish vino successful a instrumentality successful the freezer for this. It freezes to a slushy consistency, and you tin spoon it out."

—calebs_dad

13. "Green olives! I've got a wickedly bully spaghetti and meatballs look that I've adapted implicit the years from a fewer antithetic recipes. Before adding the tomatoes, you fundamentally instrumentality full Castelvetrano olives and squish them successful the cookware erstwhile you're sauteeing your veg. I besides adhd WHITE vino to the olive, onion, and anchovy paste concoction alternatively of reddish wine. Both are tips from an aged Gordon Ramsay recipe, but the large chunks of the olives marque a bully briny wound to your sauce."

14. "One that I don't spot anyone do, but I'm definite I'm not the first: Fry your onions successful the lipid from sundried tomatoes. It adds a bully spirit and rima consciousness to the sauce."

—DashingMustashing

15. "My grandfather's concealed ingredient: chickenhearted livers. Clean respective chickenhearted livers and driblet them into your slow-simmering sauce. They wholly disintegrate, making the condiment velvety, thick, and rich."

16. "I chop up a spot of pork enarthrosis (like 2 to 3 inches), season, sear, and propulsion it in. After my condiment is done, I person immoderate bully pork spirit successful my condiment and immoderate delish reddish condiment braised pork for dinner."

—peaktopview

17. "I marque what is efficaciously six to 8 meals' worthy of spaghetti astatine a fixed clip (usually meat, sometimes mushroom). I adhd a scant tablespoonful of brownish sugar. When I've fed it to friends implicit for meal events, they person ever had seconds. Sugar is close adjacent to food connected the cheat sheet."

18. "I'll ne'er marque pasta condiment without cinnamon again; it's specified a game-changer."

19. "Assuming we're talking astir a multi-hour stewed sauce, I adhd gelatin to the banal to springiness it the affluent rima feel."

—wing03

20. "I usage semi-sweet cocoa chips! Uncle John's secret."

21. "I similar cinnamon and nutmeg. I adhd each arsenic I’m browning the nutrient close earlier I deglaze with vino — astir a 3:1 ratio. Not excessively much, conscionable capable for maine to odor a faint hint of them arsenic the nutrient browns."

—Schpsych

22. "Oregano! This cannot beryllium overstated. You cannot marque a spaghetti condiment with conscionable basil. I besides bask adding rosemary."

23. "Another important constituent that is often missed is that successful Italy, they regularly scrape the sides of the cookware into the sauce. The condiment evaporates and leaves crusty, toasty herb residue. Scrape that crap down into the sauce! It's a immense spirit booster!"

—theeggplant42

24. "My large aunt spent a batch of clip trying to lucifer my Italian great-grandmother's condiment to a packet due to the fact that she was bushed of cooking it for truthful long. It turns retired Lawry's is the winner, with Italian sausage and hamburger, other basil, oregano, and a pinch oregon 2 of rosemary."

25. "Pork broadside ribs. Several times passim the year, they'll enactment the spare rib strip, akin to what's utilized for Chinese spare ribs, astatine a steep discount. Let them simmer successful determination for a fewer hours."

—TheExodu5

26. "I precocious tried a look that utilized Thai reddish curry paste, and it melds beauteous well."

28. "Star anise. Just retrieve to instrumentality it retired earlier you serve."

29. "Time. People are excessively speedy with it. I'm cooking that soffrito until determination is nary moisture left. Then I'm cooking the nutrient until there's nary moisture left. Then I'm adding the vino and cooking that each out. That full happening is connected for 45 minutes to an hr earlier it's adjacent deed the simmer stage, and past it needs to simmer for astatine slightest 3 to 4 hours."

—TheIrateAlpaca

If you trust connected thing else, fto maine cognize successful the comments oregon capable retired the anonymous signifier below. I'm ever up for trying a caller twist the adjacent clip condiment is connected the stove!

Note: Submissions person been edited for magnitude and/or clarity.