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how curious - why would you process the tomatoes (and dirty your food processor) when you could just buy a 28 oz. can of crushed tomatoes?

Sometimes Cooks Illustrated can be a little too picky.

This is an interesting question. I think somewhere along the line I stopped buying crushed tomatoes because I had heard that they were not as good as whole. Now, I can't tell you where I heard that but it's something that has, for whatever reason, stuck. Cooks Illustrated usually has their reasons, and I trust them.

Here's Cook's Illustrated's position:

"In the test kitchen, we've often avoided using crushed tomatoes because the differences among leading brands are so dramatic. The textures vary from watery and thin to so thick you could stand a spoon in it. You might get peels or no peels; plentiful seeds or none; big, rough-cut chunks of tomato or a smooth, sauce-like consistency with no chunks at all."

They go on to test a number of brands..Muir Glen and Hunts Organic among other less known brands were recommended. I say keep the food processor on the shelf if you can.

Cook's Illustrated is my favorite source for dependable recipes. I tried this same recipe a couple of months ago and my family and I enjoyed it. I'm not a fan of cream sauces with pasta but I was pleasantly surprised with this one.

What's the over/under on how long it takes Cook's Illustrated to send a cease and desist letter, asking you to remove this recipe? (yes, it's "adapted," but they are very aggressive in protecting their intellectual property)

There's a version of this in "The Best 30-Minute Recipe" that I make fairly regularly, but it adds the tomatoes and water all at once with the pasta so they all simmer together, no reducing of tomatoes first. I make it without the cream and find it quite filling, comforting, luxurious, etc. I'd rather have an extra ounce of cheese than 4oz of cream that just deadens the tomato flavor.

(I use Eden Organic Crushed Tomatoes, which come without salt, and adjust the seasonings as appropriate.)

After rereading the recipe, Cooks Illustrated says they tested the crushed tomatoes, but the whole ones worked better.

@notamerican: Not sure about that. I know the cream sounds strange, but it's really an ingenius way to add body and creaminess without making the dish too heavy.

@mdeatherage: They say the cooking of the tomatoes first helps get rid of the that raw tomato taste.

I'm making this tonight. I browned a couple of hot Italian sausages out of their casings and sauteed some diced onions before I added the garlic and tomatoes. I used crushed tomatoes instead of the whole, seems to have worked well. The taste that I've had of it is quite delicious, I think this will be my go-to baked ziti method from now on! It's definitely not too much liquid, it cooks up nice and al dente...just be sure to stir often, as the macaroni gets stuck to the bottom of the skillet (I didn't use non-stick).

Maybe not cholesterol friendly, but oh so yummy! :D

I cooked up a batch of this over the weekend, and it was incredible! Thanks so much for sharing!

It's not soupy at all, and I added extra red pepper flakes (on purpose). I also used half fontina and half mozzarella ( I didn't have quite as much mozzarella in the fridge as I thought), and it was still delicious! And if you don't have an oven-safe skillet, you can transfer it to a baking dish before putting it in the oven (as I had to do).

"i've heard the argument that the most bruised lowest quality toms are sent to the crushed conveyor line, and better quality ones get sent to the whole can line. "

This is absolutely true. Here's the logic: If you had a perfect tomato, would you crush it to sell it? No.

Same goes for pre-sliced shrooms and other "prepared" veg. The stores and manufacturers and growers are not doing this out of the goodness of their hearts. They're doing it out of necessity. If a veg or fruit is bruised, it gets made into something else, with the rotted part cut out. THEN, they charge you more for it citing "processing" as an added expense. So you're paying more for food that no one wanted to buy in the first place. At least when Costco makes chix salad out of unsold rotisserie chix, they label it as "rotisserie chix salad." Moral of the story - buy your own mushrooms and slice them. That cut made by you indicates complete freshness by the shroom's white flesh - and not a veg that has been exposed to air for God knows how long then wrapped in plastic.

I believe that milk past its date is returned to the dairy, re-pasteurized and made into other products like chocolate milk - but I can't remember where I heard that so I hesitate to get behind the statement 100%.

Back to the recipe - I'm THRILLED that CI has printed a recipe for tomato sauce containing no sugar. Sugar in tomato sauce is an abomination and, like cans of crushed toms, is a way to mask "less than stellar" produce. If toms are so bad you have to add sugar, make something else.

One more thing - whole peeled toms that are FP'd will have no skins. I believe unless diced tomatoes are labeled as "skinless" the product will contain skins which some people don't like.

Just as an FYI, probably best to not use whole wheat pasta in this recipe. I made it using just that awhile back and the noodles completely disintegrated and became mushy. And to think that I was trying to balance a bit of health with the fatty deliciousness!