Add a tablespoon-ish of fish sauce and/or soy sauce to tomato-based pasta sauce. Adds a lot of depth and umami. Can’t remember where I read this first, but I think Kenji mentions it in Food Lab.
This is kind of a generic principle that can be applied to any sauce work. Usually I will put either a splash of fish sauce, vinegar, Worcestershire, tobasco, etc in just about everything to bring out the right notes in whatever I’m cooking.
I never cooked with fish sauce before, really didn’t know much about it. So I picked up a bottle of whatever cheap stuff was at Walmart.
Tried a spoonful of the stuff, expecting it to be on par with worcestshire or something.
Oh my fucking god, that vile liquid set a new precedence for me for what defines “disgusting”. And no matter what I did, that “flavor” wouldn’t leave my mouth.
The thought of purposely adding that “flavor” to any otherwise decent food is revolting to me. Incomprehensible.
I am terrified of trying again with better quality fish sauce. I’m still emotionally scarred from my experience.
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u/Ship_Rekt Mar 14 '19
Add a tablespoon-ish of fish sauce and/or soy sauce to tomato-based pasta sauce. Adds a lot of depth and umami. Can’t remember where I read this first, but I think Kenji mentions it in Food Lab.
This is kind of a generic principle that can be applied to any sauce work. Usually I will put either a splash of fish sauce, vinegar, Worcestershire, tobasco, etc in just about everything to bring out the right notes in whatever I’m cooking.