This week at the farmer’s market I saw overripe tomatoes at one of my favorite vendors. My mom asked me to make a pasta dish and I could have used canned tomatoes from the store, but why not pick up some fresh ones.

I went to go buy 5 pounds of overripe tomatoes (I’m talking some parts that look pretty bad), and she decided not to charge me. I’ve been shopping at the market for a couple years now so it is really nice to have that community.

There are some very opinionated ways to make marinara sauce from scratch. Many say that you need to use tomatoes from the San Marzano region in Italy. And that you also need to remove the skin before starting by boiling it in water briefly and removing the skin. If you stop and think about this, why did this dogma start that the best tomatoes in the world only come from one certain region?

The first time I ever made fresh pasta sauce was probably 12 years ago when I was just learning to cook. It was a friend at my old work and he told me to put to carve an x with a knife on top of the tomato, boil it for a minute. Peel the tomatoes when it is cool, then sweat garlic in oil then add the tomatoes in there. Cook the tomatoes for about 45 minutes in a mild simmer, then voila, done!

I think the convenience of supermarkets has taken us away about thinking about food, but in particular vegetables.

A couple years ago I asked one of the tomato vendors on their recipe of cooking a marinara sauce. They said just chop the tomatoes and cook it in garlic and olive oil.

I did it, and the sauce was spectacular. It got me to realize that the quality of your produce is directly related to the outcome.

The key to making a marinara sauce isn’t that it comes to San marzano, it just that whatever tomato you get needs to be good quality. Period.

When it comes to food, don’t be afraid to question dogma, and experiment.