SUNDAY SAUCE

for coming and going

I made this sauce at my dad’s house on a journey to baked ziti. It was definitely the best baked ziti I had ever made and everyone in the house (my aunts, uncles, cousins, and brothers) agreed. We ate and then played cards while my dad listened from a hospice bed in the other room. At one point my chair broke and fell out from under me. It was one of a set of dining room chairs that I had sat on as a young child unwilling to eat any more dinner but forbidden from leaving the table. I fell through the chair as the legs gave out and we all laughed together in unison. My dad died a week later. We were all there until he was gone. It was complicated and it sucked and it continues to suck and be complicated but I had never felt closer to my family or more grateful to be a member of it. I’ve been wanting to develop a baked ziti recipe and maybe one day I will, but it all starts with the sauce. This month, I have made this sauce three times and fed it to three breastfeeding friends on three separate occasions. Which is to say it’s great for celebrating, whether you’re coming into this world or going out of it.

The grocery store in my home town is Elk County Foods. It was previously called Jubilee and before that, The Market Basket, which is how it is canonically known to everyone in town (or at least to my family which makes up at least fourteen percent of the town). It’s a small, dank store that has changed little in my thirty-five years, but now sells alcohol, which was a godsend to me during this past February while I watched my father die. When I was a kid, my mom brought us here to rent VHS tapes. You picked out your tape(s) from one of three shelves and paid the lady in the window to rent it for a few days. When you returned it, you gave it back to the lady in the window. Once, my mom ran in to quickly return a tape, leaving me in the passenger seat of the running minivan. I immediately plopped over the center console and grabbed the gear shift on the steering column, pulling it into neutral. With my three year old ass in the driver’s seat, the van went careening backwards through the parking lot headed straight for the highway on the other side. A man jumped into the car and in one motion, grabbed me and slammed his foot on the brake. When my mom came out of the store a full ninety seconds after she had gone in, the man screamed at her. Another time at the Market Basket, after my older brother had whispered in my ear, I shouted down the aisle to my mom on the other end, “Andy said boys have penises and girls have BAGINAS.” When I was a preteen, my friends and I would pull our change and ride our bikes there to buy Everlasting Gobstoppers and bags of chips to hold us over so we could keep swimming in the Clarion until the sun went down. Going into the Market Basket now feels like walking into my elementary school. A relic of the time before I was fifteen. I feel like my head will punch through the yellowed drop ceiling. They carry some things but not most things. They don’t carry anchovies or anchovy paste, which is how I would usually start a red sauce. They carry whole peeled tomatoes but not any brands I’ve ever seen. They carry fresh parsley but not fresh basil. They do, however, carry pork neck bones and if you have those, you might just end up making the best sauce of your life.

This recipe is adapted with baby back ribs, as most grocery stores do not carry pork neck bones. This is just a tribute, you gotta believe me. And I wish you were there.

SUNDAY SAUCE

2-3lb baby back ribs (or 1lb pork neck bones)
1 small onion diced
4 tbsp butter
10 cloves garlic
1 tbsp oregano
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 tbsp anchovy paste
2 handfuls of fresh basil divided
½ cup red wine
5 28oz cans whole peeled tomato

Cut your ribs into 2- 4 pieces depending on the size of your pot. Season the ribs with salt up to 4 hours before you begin the sauce. In a Dutch oven, heat a few tablespoons of olive oil. Add in your ribs, working in batches if necessary. Brown the ribs on each side then remove them and from the pot and set them aside. Add butter, onion, and garlic and use a wooden spoon to stir and scrape the fond. Add a little bit of water to soften the onions and deglaze the pot. Once the onions are soft, add the oregano, tomato, and anchovy pastes and basil and stir. Add in red wine and simmer until the wine has cooked down. Add peeled tomatoes using your hands or a potato masher to break them up. Add the ribs back into the pot and place the lid on. Simmer on low for four hours or place in a 300 degree oven for four hours. Remove the bones from the ribs and use a potato masher to break up the pork. Add in any additional protein, such as meatballs or sausage links. Simmer for 30-60 more minutes until the meat is cooked through and the sauce has thickened. Add the remaining fresh basil. Serve over pasta or whatever weird stuff you like.

This past weekend I spent some time down the shore with my best friend and I fell head over heels in love with it, and with New Jersey. I saw Lucy Dacus at The Stone Pony and it was her best performance of the five I have seen. I find myself spending a lot of time talking about how much I don’t like summer but this summer snuck up on me. It has weaseled its sweaty way into my heart. Anyway, September is right around the corner and that’s something we can all celebrate. Brothmonger HQ will be closed from August 14 until August 25 because of Little Italy Days and because I am getting a breast reduction. I am looking forward to moving through the world without huge boobs. Soups this week are chicken noodle, hungarian mushroom, special tomato, and kielbasa cabbage.

It feels very good to write a newsletter again. Thank you for being here and all that you do.

I love you
-the BMer