I usually make quick sauces with my pasta and use whole canned peeled tomatoes. To alter for fresh, I’d score the tomatoes with a knife, then blanch and peel the skin off as the first step.

My default tomato-based sauce is:

• olive oil
• a few whole tomatoes (peeled) – maybe about ~3 decently sized ones?
• garlic (either fresh minced or garlic powder)
• dried basil
• salt
• 1/4 tsp or so of capers
• a few kalamata olives
• pinch of MSG
• pinch of cayenne pepper

When using fresh garlic, I add it to the pan first – with garlic powder I add it with the other seasonings. I basically just combine everything, break up the tomatoes with a spatula, and let it cook down on medium heat (stirring occasionally) while I boil my spaghetti – then finish the spaghetti in the sauce.

I usually make this just for myself and eyeball the ingredients – so unfortunately, I don’t have exact measurements for most of it.

This is basically a variant of spaghetti puttanesca without anchovies – feel free to add those instead of (or in addition to) the MSG if you’d prefer.