• In a large pot, boil water on the stove on high heat.
• Fill a large pot of cold water and place right next to the pot of boiling water. Do not heat up this second pot of water.
• Place tomatoes in the hot boiling water to BLANCH until a crack appears in each tomato, this takes about 2 minutes.
• Immediately remove each tomato as they crack and place them in the pot of cold water to stop the cooking.
• When all tomatoes are in the cold water pot, take it to the sink and carefully drain the water which at this point will be warmed up from the hot tomatoes.
• Refill it with more cold water to stop the tomatoes from cooking.
• As the tomatoes are cooling, and safe to not burn your hands, begin to pull the skins off of each tomato and remove the stem.
• Using a hand-held tomato puree device OR a simple mesh strainer, mush the tomatoes through to remove the seeds.
• I do this twice.
• As you are doing this, remove the chunky pieces of tomato pulp and place in the bowl of strained juice, otherwise all you're going to have is juice.
• Take an immersion blender (what I call a 'boat motor') and puree all of the pulp in the seedless juices.
• In a tall pot on low-medium heat, melt one stick of butter.
• Add the pureed tomatoes.
• Add the peeled, cut-in-half onion.
• Add salt and sugar.
• Simmer on the stove with a pizza pan underneath to prevent burning, for 45 minutes.
• Remove the onion halves.
• Add the tomato paste (this is my addition to Marcella Hazan's recipe that we felt was too runny).
• Simmer for another 15 minutes to thicken.
• Taste, taste, taste.

RECOMMENDATION: As Marcella Hazan states in her classic Italian cookbook, this is Marinara at it's very purist and she's right. However, we like the addition of "sofretto" (onions, celery, garlic, and possibly carrots) and fresh basil. I have a recipe for that as well on my blog "La Bella Vita Cucina" and it is delightful!