Is sunday gravy the same as spaghetti sauce?

[cookinglisa]

Ok, I am a Californian. Never lived in NYC or NJ ( So not much exposure to true Italian cooking) or the south.

Just made 14 lbs of homemade italian hot sausage ( not in casing) because I bought 20 lbs of pork butt for $1.39/ lb yesterday. Had butcher grind 14 lbs of it for sausage and used the other 6 lbs for Chinese roast pork (cha siu). Gonna put most of the sausage in the freezer uncooked, but was browsing for recipes tonight on CH.

Planning to make sausage gravy (so, looked up recipes for biscuits and gravy), Chicago pizza (which having never been to Chicago, I have never yet had) . . .and now looking up recipes for Sunday gravy or sausage spaghetti xauce.

Which bring me back to my original question: What is the difference between spaghetti sauce and sunday tomato gravy?

I already make a mean homemade sausage spaghetti sauce. . .but thought I'd try sunday gravy if there really is a difference.

[HillJ]

Every Italian household I've ever had the good and delicious fortune to know served Sunday gravy that included meat (ground beef, pork balls or both enhanced with fresh garlic, traditional Italian sausage and a large piece of pork on the bone) stewing low & slow in a large pot of tomato sauce (that they had jarred themselves over the summer) and at the finish a bit of fresh basil. The sauce was thin and the meats flavored the sauce. The meat was served on its own dish and the sauce was poured over prepared macaroni.

Spaghetti sauce was made without meat and served on macaroni that also including toppings of grated parm cheese and even ricotta cheese. A light sauce.

The sauce varied family to family and I can't recall ever being disappointed or hungry the rest of the day--great home cooking!

[tonifi]

I grew up in a neighbourhood that was heavily populated by Greek and Italian families, usually second generation, but Grandma, who was first generation, often lived with one of her kids. The moms called it sauce. The grandma called it gravy. We always thought that 'gravy' was a little bit wrong, an error or dumbing-down of translation...kind of the way that Sal or Nikki's grandma would tell them to 'brush their hairs.' Sometimes it was 'red gravy', as in "Get you some of that good red gravy on that bread." It was usually made of tomatoes, onion, garlic, carrots, celery, and whatever bits and pieces of meat had been left from dinners the week before. Every refrigerator had a bowl in it that contained half a pork chop, some gristly slices of steak, half a sausage, and the end of the roll of salami....all of it went into the pot on Sunday. I think a lot of my neighbours were probably Sicilian, which may account for the word 'gravy', if earlier posters are right in thinking that it may be more of a Sicilian thing. I cringe to admit that we didn't differentiate much between 'Sicilian' and 'Italian', everyone was referred to (in our defence, also self-referred to) as 'dagos'.
When my rural-Missouri/Anglo family said 'gravy' they meant white gravy/milk gravy made with some sort of fried meat pan scrapings (mostly bacon or pork, but often fried chicken and even, sometimes, hamburger, flour and milk and served over potatoes, bread, or biscuits. My mother made the best gravy, ever. She'd spoon some gravy on a piece of toast and shake about a tablespoon of pepper on it and call it breakfast. She didn't much like to cook, but she could made that cast-iron skillet walk and talk when she made gravy.

[Jay F]

I grew up in NJ. I'm not Italian, but my father grew up next door to a woman from Italy, and she taught him how to cook, so I have a bit of "nonna" tradition when it comes to food.

I never heard the word "gravy" used except in reference to that flour-based sauce you put on sliced roast meat and mashed potatoes, usually on Sunday, until an episode of The Sopranos, in which Dr. Melfi's son referred to "Ginzo gravy" at a family dinner (and there's that G-word again, sort of).

A recipe for Sunday gravy appeared in The Sopranos Family Cookbook. Allegedly it's from Artie Bucco, but I think it comes from Rao's IRL (I don't have the book with me now).

[scunge]

I was told that the Neapolitan's called it ragu (gravy ?) and the Sicilian's called it salsa (sauce). My non English speaking Sicilian grandmother it was salsa ,sugo or if there was meat in it ragu

[roxlet]

No, I don't think so. My mother was of Neopolitan extraction, and she said "sauce" not "gravy." Her mother did too.

[Jay F]

I think Lina was from Naples, but I'd have to check her out on ancestry.com to know for sure.

I never heard "sugo" until I read Marcella Hazan's first cookbook in the '70s, The Classic Italian Cookbook. She also used the word "ragu," which I of course knew as that crappy jarred sauce. Even when I was a kid, I knew Ragu was awful.

And salsa was always a Mexican thing for me. (Or did I read *that* in Marcella, too?)

[roxlet]

Salsa is just "sauce" in Italian.

[Jay F]

Aha. Thanks, R.

[scunge]

An often used product in the SAUCE was pig skin sometime rolled stuffed with parsley and garlic Later it was picked out and sliced .There could of had hard cooked eggs in some as well as raisins . What I do remember fondly is the heated disputes over the making of the proper macaroni sauce as well as many other foods. Little old ladies fighting putting curses on each other regarding the proper making of a polpetta Then they would be back to being friends............. maybe.

[hotoynoodle]

this sounds very southern -- possibly sicilian?

we only used onions and garlic, no carrots, celery or (gasp) raisins. ;)

[roxlet]

It probably is Sicilian. I remember one year when my father was still alive, and my husband made cassoulet, which he makes by lining the casserole it's baked in with pig skin. My father (of Sicilian descent) was so excited to see this when we reached the bottom of the dish, and ate it with relish.

[fourunder]

What you have describe is Cotenne......or Pig Skin Braciole...

http://www.goodfoodstories.com/2012/05/17/cotenne/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rww3kR...

[roxlet]

I always tell the story of two of my father's older sisters (he had 4), and the proper way to make struffoli. We're at Aunt Rose's house (she's the oldest), and Aunt Therese has brought struffoli to Christmas dinner. "These are good, Therese," Rose says, and then asks, "What did you fry them in?" Therese's eye begins to twitch a little. "Mazzola," she says. And Rose shakes her head sagely, with a tiny bit of triumph in her voice, "They're good," she says, and then the coup de grâce, "but they're not authentic."

[echoclerk]

As an Australian living in the UK I find it pretty funny that of all the terms you have used above I"m least confused by what you mean by "Chinese roast pork (cha siu)".

That is I have never heard of "Sunday Gravy" and I suspect the "Gravy" and "Biscuits" are nothing like I imagine them to be. Or even referring to minced beef as "Sausage" seems categorically wrong - is that what you mean by "sausage spaghetti sauce" or "sausage gravy".

Its so weird how perverted certain terms can seem.

[sparrowgrass]

"Sausage" in gravy is Italian pork sausage, flavored with fennel. The sausage in biscuits and gravy is also pork sausage, but flavored with sage and red pepper.

Biscuits are not cookies, they are made with baking powder, white flour and shortening, with some milk or buttermilk (better). Like scones, I think, but no sugar.

[sunshine842]

and Italian gravy is typically tomato-based.

"Biscuits and gravy" is a flour and milk-based sauce.

And yes, biscuits are an unsweetened scone.

[deet13]

Don't forget there's Southern red gravy, which is tomato and roux based...

[sunshine842]

roux being flour and fat...

Italian gravy doesn't have flour or milk.

[echoclerk]

This is what I find so horrifying. That someone would refer to pasta sauces in general as merely "gravy".

It just seems such an injustice! In Australia and the UK gravy can only ever refer to the basic sauce served with Roasted Meats / or Meat Pies made that is traditionally made from flour, water and drippings. or increasingly, in Australia, made from Gravox powder. See the photos of that brown goop on your roast meat.

[sunshine842]

we don't call our charcoal grill a "barbie", either, but we really don't care if you do.

[echoclerk]

So in parts of the USA they will refer to a tomato based Pasta Sauce / (ie Bolognese Sauce) as "Italian Gravy" .

It just seems rude. Like calling foie gras "French Liver" or something

[sunshine842]

no, they just call it gravy, or Sunday gravy.

of all the battles you could pick, changing what generations of families call a given dish is one that pretty closely resembles a windmill.

And the French call foie gras "fat liver" -- why shouldn't anyone else?

[cookinglisa]

that's why I started this thread.

I live in California --and even though I'm somewhat of a foodie and pretty adventurous when I cook, and have traveled to the east coast and Alabama ( where my daughter attends college)-- I had NEVER heard of Sunday Gravy.

I had heard of the white sausage gravy made with milk, though. (Is that gravy just known as "sausage milk gravy"?)

. . still trying to figure out the biscuit aspect (do I need White Lily? Why the distinction between aluminium baking powder and non, what are angel biscuits, what is considered a true southern biscuit?)

Obviously, in Cali, there is not nearly much focus on sunday gravy, southern cooking, etc

When I write about sausage spaghetti sauce, I use ground sausage and simmer in tomato sauce with italian herbs and garlic-- and serve with boiled spaghetti noodles or pasta. I think that is what east coasters call a meat sauce ( which I have now learned is NOT what sunday gravy is)

I think there should be a regional foods thread . . it would be amazing to learn what foods are mostly served in what areas. I'm betting there are probably lots of foods common only to Calif that the British, or Southerners, or native east coasters have no clue what they are.

(I'm just amazed that until a few days ago, I had no idea what "Sunday gravy/ sauce" was -- apparently, a very commonly known dish that has been around for generations).

[Ruth Lafler]

I'm a third-generation Californian, and I've watched several people eat an artichoke (i.e. a whole one, not artichoke hearts or pieces) for the first time!

[marisold]

I'm from North Carolina, and all I've ever heard is "sausage gravy" for the gravy made with milk. Around here, everybody knows it's made with milk; it goes without saying. The main distinction I've heard all my life is "white gravy" (made with milk) or "brown gravy" (made with pan drippings and water. In my experience chicken gravy was always white, but gravy with beef could go either way.

A "true southern biscuit" is the one your grandma made!

[sunshine842]

don't get "Sunday gravy" from Italian families with "sausage gravy" - they're two completely different sauces that have little to nothing in common.

"Sunday gravy" to someone of Italian descent is a tomato-based meat sauce (as above, the variations are endless). It might or might not have sausage, depending on who's making it.

"Sausage gravy" to a Southerner is a milk-and-flour-based sauce over sauteed sausage.

White Lily flour is a lower-protein flour made from soft wheat. It makes very light and tender baked goods (not just biscuits) because of the lower protein.

Angel biscuits are just one of the kerjillions of biscuit recipes out there.

And there are dozens of regional boards out there....if the mods don't move your regional-foods request to the Home Cooking board.

[echoclerk]

So according to this recipe: http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/...

Sausage Gravy is a Béchamel sauce made with the fat from pork sausages and with onions, pork mince, and other seasonings. That just sounds weird to me.

[melpy]

But it it oh so good.
I make mine a little spicy with a splash of maple syrup ton sweeten

[sunshine842]

echoclerk, it might not be a bad idea to open your mind to ideas from different countries.

The fact that it's different doesn't make it weird or bad, any more than anything you service is weird or bad to someone from a a different country.

It's not better or worse -- it's just different. It would be a hideously boring world if we ate exactly the same thing and called it the exact same word.

[Bryan Pepperseed]

Nothing weird about sawmill gravy.

[PattiCakes]

It is an inexpensive "belly filler" that can be served for breakfast or supper, not unlike SOS but heartier. It makes whatever meat you have stretch.

In my neck of the woods (Philly) the "gravy" made on Sunday in South Philly is a tomato-based pasta sauce. I work with a number of people who would NEVER call it "spaghetti sauce"; they make a big pot of gravy on Sundays. It might be a meat sauce, but more often than not it has meatballs and is flavored with meat on the bone which then cooks to shreds and flavors the gravy.

[cookinglisa]

what is "SOS"?

[fourunder]

Creamed Chipped Beef.....Sh*t on a Shingle

http://www.hormelfoods.com/brands/hor...

[roxlet]

""Sunday gravy" to someone of Italian descent is a tomato-based meat sauce (as above, the variations are endless). It might or might not have sausage, depending on who's making it."

Actually, no. I'm of Italian descent, and the phrase "Sunday gravy" was meaningless to me until I was an adult and read about it. I think your statement is quite a generalization.

[jenscats5]

In my ex's family "Sauce" with a capital-S was the spaghetti sauce made with the meats....I always used pork neck bones & pork rib ends. The Sunday gravy around here is typically a thinner (but not very thin) smooth tomato spaghetti sauce.

[Floridagirl]

I'm not Italian but grew up on Long Island, NY. To me, Sunday gravy is the one with lots of meats in it. Otherwise, there's marinara sauce, which is quick cook and has no meat. If you're just putting ground meat in your sauce, that's meat sauce. Sunday gravy normally has big meat. like meatballs, sausage links, braciole, and pork ribs. BTW, I don't know where you live, but as someone who has lived in the South for a long time, if you're following a recipe for biscuits and gravy, double the sausage and make angel biscuits, they are much better.

[cookinglisa]

what are angel biscuits, and can i make good biscuits if I don't have white liy flour ( I think that is the name) , which I can't get in California. Would it be worth it for my daughter who attends Univ of Alabama to bring some home for the Holidays?

I did make homemade sausage gravy last night with my homemade sausage and it turned out much better than what I have had in restaurants . . .and the only restaurant that I have had it in the south was at "Cracker Barrel", I think the name was).

[hotoynoodle]

i should think anything you make would be better than what can be had at a cracker barrel. ;)

my brooklyn italian-american family always just called it sauce. my interloper sicilian aunt called it gravy. it was long cooked, with browned meat like short ribs, neck bones or soup bones. it included both canned tomatoes and paste. browned meatballs ( a combo of ground pork and sausage) and sausage were added towards the end.

[Will Owen]

Angel biscuits are raised yeast biscuits rather than a baking powder quick bread. I consider "biscuit" to be a misnomer in this case; I ordered biscuits and gravy at a place here in Pasadena, shortly after moving from Nashville, and was disappointed to be served what were basically yeast rolls and a clear brown gravy!

You CAN get White Lily in CA. Where are you?

[Saluti]

In my family all sauce was referred to as either sugo or gravy. It didn't matter if it had meat in it or not.

[Brandon Nelson]

Sunday gravy is a ragu where leftovers were repurposed.

I like to make this the last night we are at a vacation rental. All the scraps of meat left over from other meals find their way into the pot.

[robt5265]

I make this with sausage in casing, sliced pork butt (pork steaks w/ bone in ), any cheap cut of beef with bone, imported Italian tomatoes, red wine and herbs toward the end. The meats are removed because it cooks for at least 12 hrs, and they are pretty much flavorless by this time. The sauce is an almost brown-red color and intensely rich in flavor. Maybe serve with meatballs, but doesnt really need anything added. You might serve with sauted Italian sausage, onions and peppers.

[robt5265]

I forgot to say that the meats need to be heavily browned in olive oil, then removed while you deglaze the pan with red wine. Add the meats back, along with the tomatoes. Simmer for 12 hrs.. or more at a very low temp.

[cookinglisa]

I dont think there is much " sunday gravy or sauce" in italian restaurants in Calif. I have gone to italian restaurants in "Little Italy" in Sf and lots in central and southern calif ( where I live), but none on the menu -- at least by that name . . .hence my never hearing of it before until I started doing a search.

Melpy, since I am doing a sausage and /or sausage meatball "sunday gravy" , do you (or anyone else here on this board) have a recipe for that. Who knows maybe I have been doing it all along and didn't know it. eg long simmer, crushed tomatoes, meat in the sauce . . .

The concept of using other meats such as pork chops, ribs, etc is totally a foreign concept to me...I'm definitely thinking that sunday gravy is more a east coast type of thing. The name ragu I have heard of -- but again when I have ordered it in california restaurants, there is not a mixture of different meats in it, usually just meatballs and sausage.

[grampart]

This is my basic "gravy" recipe. I usually do meatballs, sausage, pork neck bones/spareribs and leave out the piece of beef. The Rao's recipe for meatballs is pretty darned good, but I've started cooking them in the oven instead of the frying pan. Much easier, but not quite as tasty. http://therecipereader.com/sunday-gra...

[Ruth Lafler]

Yes, the Italian food traditions on the West coast are very different from the East coast due to different immigration patterns (on the East Coast primarily from Naples and Sicily, in San Francisco mainly from Lucca and Genoa). In addition, like almost all West coast populations, the immigrants were more assimilated and less concentrated into neighborhoods that reinforced cultural traditions and developed new ones specific to the neighborhoods.

[sbp]

My understanding is all Sunday gravy is spaghetti sauce, but not all spaghetti sauce is Sunday gravy. Gravy has to have the mixture of meats in it.

[smtucker]

From my non-italian background, spaghetti sauce can be no-cook, quick-cook, heck, it can be pesto!
Sunday gravy or ragu is a long simmered tomato sauce with whole cuts of meat. This is a meal that one has in Italy though they serve the primo, pasta with the sauce, and then the meat is served as a secondo. In the Northeast, the whole thing with pasta seems to be served together unless the grandmother is the first generation.

I never heard the term Sunday gravy growing up to be honest. It was all just called Sunday dinner. The smells in my apartment building on Sundays was quite amazing as each family cooked a slightly different ragu while the family was at mass.

[coll]

? Always served the meal as: antipasto, then pasta, then meat, then maybe chicken if desired; then espresso, cordials and dessert. Never had it all served all at once, and I have lived in the Northeast my whole life.

[roxlet]

Yes, it was never served all at once. We would have salad after the pasta and meatballs. Dessert, unless it was fruit, was rare.

[coll]

We do serve the salad with the meat, that's the only doubling up.

[melpy]

From what I understand it is just the name that is different. We make our sauce using sausage as the base, although it is not a meat sauce. The meat just flavors the sauce. Like they said you can use any meat as a base.

We are from Southern CT are call it sauce not gravy.
And we call all pasta macaroni as the generic term.

[Joyfull]

www.chocodog.com/sauce2.htm

From what I've read, Sunday sauce or gravy, is Italian American rather than true Italian. The above link might peak your interest.

Drat. Try this.. www.chocodog.com/chocodog/sauce2.htm

[scunge]

Growing up in a predominantly Sicilian part of Brooklyn we called it salsa ,sugo ,ragu but never gravy.

[roxlet]

Yes, I am Italian and also grew up in Brooklyn, and I never heard the term "gravy" until I was an adult. My mother would say that she was making sauce. That implied a long-cooked tomato sauce made with some combination meatballs, sausage, braciole, and a piece of pork "sauce meat," which was usually a chunk of pork. Anything other than this was referred to by its component parts -- pasta with ceci, pasta with peas, pasta fagioli, pasta con le sarde, with the exception of marinara, which was without any flavorings other than garlic. Gravy was what you made with a roast like chicken or beef.

[coll]

Glad to hear this, I always heard it called "sauce" too, in both my husband's family and mine. Maybe "meat sauce" at the most. He's from Brooklyn, I'm from the Bronx (1950s/1960s). My husband did have a friend our age whose mother said "gravy" and I understood what she was saying, but it was weird fo me. Sunday sauce, I have no idea where that came from.. I feel like the two terms got popular after the Victoria Gotti show, with people who didn't actually grow up with it.

[roxlet]

Yes, the Sunday gravy or sauce thing is weird for me too since my mother usually made sauce twice a week -- Thursdays and Sundays.

[sunshine842]

and a South Boston Italian friend of mine won't call it anything *but* gravy.

[jns7]

Sunshine842, hi - did you ever post your Milanese grandmother's recipe for meat sauce and instructions for lasagne? I'd love to see them. Thanks!

[sunshine842]

Not my grandmother, the grandmother of a dear friend of mine...it's really a very standard meat sauce (and more a list of ingredients than a recipe in the truest sense of the word!)-- onions, garlic, celery, ground beef (yes, ground, not sliced/diced), whole tomatoes (crushed as you add them), paste, and a splash of whatever red wine happens to be on hand -- the only two things that make hers different is the use of a couple of finely-diced carrots (adds a bit of sweetness, and counteracts the acidity of the tomatoes) -- and a healthy grating of nutmeg over the ricotta in the lasagna -- it adds an amazingly complex flavor to the lasagna.

The other key is making it the day before and letting it work overnight in the fridge.

[jns7]

Thanks!

[fourunder]

Spaghetti sauce can be anything you want it to be.....meat or no meat.

Sunday gravy typically is a ragu ....or meat sauce. It can have any or all of the following

Sweet Sausage
Hot Sausage
Meatballs
Pork Shank/Osso Bucco
Spare Ribs
Country Style Ribs
Pork Shoulder/Butt
Beef Shanks/Osso Bucco
Chuck Beef
Braciole
Ox Tails
Short Ribs

here are a couple of threads that have some member family recipes......including mine.

http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/606333#4536780

http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/6564...