Tomato Cream Sauce

This tomato cream sauce recipe is packed with rich, tangy flavor! It’s easy to prepare in just 30 minutes.

Looking for a good tomato sauce? Here’s your recipe: this one Tomato Cream Sauce! Rich cream is the perfect combination with rich, flavorful tomatoes. The way the cream complements the flavor and texture is just stunning. It’s similar to an Italian vodka sauce but a lot less work. We also have a great vegan version for you. Here’s how!

Ingredients for the tomato cream sauce

This tomato and cream sauce is easy and only requires a handful of ingredients. In fact, we like to do it on a weekday when we don’t know what to do. It tastes a lot better than a jar of marinara from the store: there’s something in it realism of house sauce. Here’s what you need:

• olive oil
• Garlic
• fennel seeds
• crushed tomatoes (see notes below)
• tomato paste
• whipped cream (or cashew cream for vegans)
• Onion
• Dried oregano
• salt and pepper

Find the best canned tomatoes

With this tomato cream sauce, the quality of the tomatoes is particularly important. Be sure to use the best quality canned tomatoes in this recipe! Here are some pointers on what to look for:

• Look for Fire Roasted Tomatoes if you can find them. They are flame roasted before canning, and the flavor is mild and develops right out of the can.
• Where to look for San Marzano tomatoes. It is an Italian tomato variety with a sweet taste.
• Can’t find it either? Just use the best canned mashed tomatoes you can find.

How to make creamy tomato sauce: some flavor secrets

This tomato cream sauce has some flavor secrets that make it even more amazing! Here are a few things to consider (except for canned tomatoes, of course):

• The secret ingredient? fennel seeds. The fennel adds a hearty, meaty flavor that can’t be duplicated. Don’t leave it aside!
• Add half a whole onion (no dicing needed!). This is one of our favorite tomato sauce hacks. Toss in a peeled onion and let the flavor soak in—no chopping required.
• Let simmer until thickened. This should take around 20-30 minutes. If you have 30 minutes, use it! Tastes even better if you simmer it a little more.

Vegan variant: use cashew cream

Do you want to make vegan tomato cream sauce? We’re here for you. Replace whipped cream with equal parts cashew cream! Cashew Cream is a sauce made from soaked cashews that magically blends with a dairy alternative. We use it in many of our creamy vegan dishes and it works like a charm.

Cashew Cream adds a rich twist to our Vegan Ranch, Creamy Vegan Marinara Pasta, and Wild Rice Soup.

Serve with 1 pound pasta (or tortellini).

Once you have your tomato and cream sauce, 1lb of pasta works! You can use it for any type of pasta: long pasta like spaghetti and bucatini, or short pasta like rigatoni, mussels, farfalle, etc. If you don’t want to use everything at once, keep in the fridge for up to 1 week.

A favorite way to serve it here? In this easy tortellini recipe! (It’s a bigger and better version of tortellini.) Just make this sauce, cook 18 ounces of chilled tortellini, and toss them together. Yummy!

More pasta sauce recipes

Want more homemade pasta sauces? Here are our best sauce recipes:

This tomato cream sauce recipe is…

Vegetarian, vegan, plant-based, dairy-free and gluten-free.