Photo by Nicole Roegner

LOCAL PRODUCT

What’s a Deadhead with a culinary bent to do? Create a Grateful Red marinara sauce ($7), of course. Longtime Valley caterer and musician Stuart Epstein first saw the Grateful Dead in 1973 in Uniondale, New York. Sixty concerts later, he was officially, hopelessly hooked. He also knew exactly what to name his spicy marinara when friends encouraged him to bottle his liquid gold, er, red.

San Marzano-style tomatoes imported from Italy form the basis of Chef Epstein’s garlicky, spicy sauce. The meaty, slightly sweet tomatoes get fine-tuned with lots of garlic, onions, fresh basil and parsley, plus a splash of lemon and red wine vinegar for balance. The preservative-free, rockin’ sauce – which Epstein first marketed two years ago – gets a heat kick from a secret blend of five different peppers.

Find Grateful Red at AJ’s Fine Foods and Luci’s Healthy Marketplace. Don’t be surprised if you run into a singing gray-haired dude in a tie-dye chef’s coat slinging sauce around town. He’s gathering his own band of grateful sauce-head followers.

DETAILS
Grateful Red Sauces
gratefulredsauces.com
602-796-2056