Miss Mimosa and Marinara Sauce

This morning my daughter and I threw on our old clothes and headed outside to paint the soon to be sidebar table in our kitchen.  My husband had primed it and raised it.  It's an old console table that was left by a previous tenant.  We are in dire need of more counter space as well as storage so we're hoping this is the solution.  The console originally had three rows of three drawers but we decided to keep only the top three and use the space left beneath for storing potatoes, onions and whatever else in wire baskets.

As I mentioned yesterday, we chose Martha Stewart's color, Mimosa.  It's a lovely shade of chartreuse that I just love!

I was extremely excited to get started but I wanted to get lunch ready.  A few months back I read a Nicholas Sparks novel called True Believer.  Aside from being a fabulous book, there was the mention of a marinara sauce in it that I made shortly after and was blown away by how easy and delicious it was.  

The ingredients are:

2 (28 oz) cans of San Marzano tomatoes
1 stick of butter
2 onions (halved)

Just peel the onions and cut off the ends.  Then cut them in half.

Place the onion in a pot and throw in your stick of butter.

Pour in your tomatoes and let simmer for an hour and a half.  You will notice the enticing smell almost immediately.  I mean, whoa!  This stuff smells amazing!  The fact that it's three ingredients makes it almost unbelievable.

While our marinara was simmering we headed outside and got down to business.  My daughter had the task of painting the inside of the shelf where the baskets will go.  She was thrilled to be able to help me with this project.  About halfway through she turned to me and said, "Mama, you're amazing!"  It was the sweetest thing and it reminded me of how important the little things are in her little 3 year old mind.  I'm so glad that I didn't sweat the small stuff but instead allowed her to help me out.  It meant the world to her.

I'm not revealing our kitchen sidebar until our baskets are in place, but here's a teaser!

After we finished painting I got ready for work and sat down and had a bowl of spaghetti.  It was scrumptious!

But I'll be honest.  The first time I made it I couldn't find San Marzano tomatoes at Trader Joe's.  I substituted 2 cans of organic tomatoes in their place.  This time around Trader Joe's had them in.  I actually liked it better the first time around.  I think it might have been due to the fact that these tomatoes were canned with bay leaves.  It lent a different flavor which I still loved, but not as much as with the organic tomatoes.  

But try it for yourself!  Paired with a nice bread and some olive oil and balsamic vinegar.... oooooh weeee!  That's a tasty dinner!  It also makes an incredible pizza sauce.  Especially with those chunks of marinated tomatoes!  Trust me, you just have to try it.