How did we come to create this delicious meal, that became a basis for an infinite number of other recipes?
We have a few written testimonies from spaniards visiting the pre-colombian Aztecs and noticing them preparing a very spicy red sauce...
this might very well have been the first implementation of what will become a very popular meal: the tomato sauce!
The first written occurence that we know of the preparation of any tomato sauce
recipe can be found in an italian book called "Cuoco galante", written by Vincenzo Corrado in 1778. At the time,
although it was not yet presented as a sauce to cover pasta.
We find the earliest evidence of pairing between tomato sauce and pasta or pizza from a chef in Macerata, Marche, around the year 1779 in a recipe by Antonio Nebbia; and then again in home cookbook called "Cucina teorico-pratica" published in 1839 in Naples in the appendix of the second edition of from Ippolito Cavalcanti, in which it was presented as a very succesful side-dish.
The modern version of the sauce and its longstanding association with pasta, came to us by a book written by a certain Pellegrino Artusi in 1891, called the science of cooking and the art of eating well.
We find the first french equivalent for the tomato sauce ("La sauce tomate") in a book written by Auguste Escoffier, "Le guide culinaire" which was first published in french in 1903. This book is still considered today as an important reference for modern cooking.
To see some actual implementations of the tomato sauce in the best spaghetti sauce recipe,
please click that link.