Regina’s Grocery Spills Their Secret Family Red Sauce Recipe
Growing up, Roman Grandinetti’s neighborhood friends would turn to his mother, Regina, for everything—advice, commiseration, and most of all, food. “She was everyone’s extended mother,” he says over the phone, manning the bread slicer at her eponymous deli, Regina’s Grocery. So when the COVID-19 pandemic upended the lives of New Yorkers, especially those low-income and at-risk, he knew what he had to do. Like his mother had done decades before, he needed to take care of the kids in his community.
Every week, Grandinetti and his team make and deliver 200 to 400 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to homeless children, teens and young adults at Streetwork NYC’s centers in the Lower East Side and Harlem. Through a donation option on their Grubhub menu, they’ve raised money to supply over 3,000. “When things started going left, I thought, how could I make things go right?” Grandinetti says. They’ve started sending cheerful confections to accompany their PB&Js: a small dessert, or an apple-cinnamon muffin. “Food is a necessity, but it’s also a memory.” On Regina’s Grocery’s website, they are raising further funds for canned goods and supplies.
They are also sending a variety of sandwiches—veggie, smoked chicken, and pork—to Lower East side police precincts and firehouses. According to reports, nearly 20% of the NYPD’s workforce is out sick due to COVID-19.
There’s a second Regina’s location in Miami, and Grandinetti says that, when the time comes, they’ll do culinary outreach there too. And although his mom cannot physically help with their shop’s altruistic project, Grandinetti says she’s checking in frequently via FaceTime.
As a mom-and-pop shop, Regina’s is unsure if they will be able to reopen their doors after all this. So how can their customers help? Donating to Regina’s Streetwork Food & Supply fund, for starters. But mostly? “You just can’t forget us,” says Grandinetti. “It's easy to forget a small business—and not just mine.”
Below, Regina’s shares their family red sauce recipe—perfect to slather on pasta, meatballs, or whatever fits your fancy.
regina-red-sauce
Regina’s Chunky Tomato Sauce
Serving Size: 4 Cans
Ingredients
1/2 cup olive oil, more than enough to coat the bottom of the pot
8 cloves garlic, chopped
4 28-ounce cans Italian Whole Peeled tomatoes (Regina loves Scalfani or Tuttorosso)
Large pinch of red pepper flakes
1 5 oz can Tomato Paste
2 teaspoons fine sea salt
Directions
Combine the olive oil and garlic in a large deep saucepan and cook over medium-low heat for about 10 minutes, stirring (careful not to burn), but to get a nice color— you want to smell it!
Add red pepper for 30 seconds to a minute. Add paste. Fill the can with a little water and add to the saucepan. Let it simmer.
Add tomatoes into a separate bowl and begin to crush them. Make sure to keep the chunks in there.
When garlic, paste and red pepper ingredients are combined together, add tomatoes and salt. Start stirring. Keep an eye on the heat to ensure it doesn't burn. Consistently stir for the next 4 hours. Time makes a perfect sauce.
Add a little salt at the end and take off the heat. Extra sauce can be kept in the freezer.
Originally Appeared on Vogue
