- I am gonna make probably one of Marcella Hazan's most famous recipes.

And it's famous because it is so simple.

I'm gonna just add some tomatoes, a little bit of onion, a little bit of butter, salt, and then that's it.

- Her recipes are very exacting, but incredibly simple.

So you think about her famous tomato sauce, and it's the simplest sauce you can make, right?

I make it all the time.

So you take tomatoes, you cut an onion in half, and you put it in the sauce.

You melt butter into that warming tomato with some salt.

- And, what, 45 minutes later, you've got a wonderful sauce.

So, there was something about demystifying that was so wonderful about her.

- I'm gonna cut this in half.

I'm going to use these canned tomatoes.

These are very natural.

So you just basically throw about two pounds of tomatoes.

So a little bit of salt, little bit of butter.

It's probably like five tablespoons to two pounds of tomato and one medium onion.

I like to use a whisk, because it really kind of helps mush up the tomatoes.

I think we go through life just making things so complex and so stressful for ourselves, and the simplest things in life are the ones that really kind of blow your mind.

I think she would just do what she needed to do to make something amazing.

Mm, nice.

I think meeting Marcella was probably one of the highlights of my life.

You know, now I am all emotional (laughs).

Oh my God (chuckles).

I'm gonna turn it down just a touch, 'cause we got 45 minutes to go.

If we reduce too fast, then it doesn't give the onion time to do its thing.

You wanna have it on that nice lowish temperature that Marcella suggests in the book, and just kind of have it ticking away.

Have it sit there being happy.

Great things happen when things connect.

You know, it's the same with people and food.

It's the meeting of minds and the meeting of flavors, and it's, when I cook, and I know for a fact that Marcella felt this too, something deep inside your soul, you know, it's earth-moving.

You connect with it.

And I think that's why people love this sauce so much.

I'm just gonna take the onion out.

A lot of people are like, "Why would you discard the onion?

That's the best bit."

But the great thing about Marcella, really, is that she knows when to add stuff, what to add, when to take it out, when to not use it.

And then we're just gonna add the pasta.

So we'll just add that there, looks good.

So this is Marcella's very, very famous tomato sauce.

Simple, soulful, perfect.

Marcella, hope you're happy.

I hope I did a good job (laughs).