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Megan McArdle

Megan McArdle - Megan McArdle is a senior editor for The Atlantic who writes about business and economics. She has worked at three start-ups, a consulting firm, an investment bank, a disaster recovery firm at Ground Zero, and The Economist. More

Megan was born and raised on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, and yes, she does enjoy her lattes, as well as the occasional extra-dry skim-milk cappuccino. Her checkered work history includes three start-ups, four years as a technology project manager for a boutique consulting firm, a summer as an associate at an investment bank, and a year spent as sort of an executive copy girl for one of the disaster-recovery firms at Ground Zero … all before the age of 30.

While working at Ground Zero, Megan started Live From the WTC, a blog focused on economics, business, and cooking. She may or may not have been the first major economics blogger, depending on whether we are allowed to throw outlying variables such as Brad Delong out of the set. From there it was but a few steps down the slippery slope to freelance journalism. She has worked in various capacities for The Economist, where she wrote about economics and oversaw the founding of Free Exchange, the magazine's economics blog. She has also maintained her own blog, Asymmetrical Information, which moved to The Atlantic, along with its owner, in August 2007.

Megan holds a bachelor's degree in English literature from the University of Pennsylvania and an M.B.A. from the University of Chicago. After a lifetime as a New Yorker, she now resides in northwest Washington, D.C., where she is still trying to figure out what one does with an apartment larger than 400 square feet.

Tuesday recipeblogging

By Megan McArdle
Aug 19 2008, 5:01 PM ET Comment

It has come to my attention that many people are buying tomato sauce in jars, even though making your own is laughably easy.  We must rectify this. 

6 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 cups onion, chopped fine
1 can plum tomatoes (I use Cento)
1 can Hunt's tomato paste
2 cloves garlic
1 small package fresh basil
1 tablespoon sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
Pepper to taste

In a heavy pot, saute the onion in the olive oil over medium heat for five minutes, until soft.  (You don't want to brown them).  Puree the other ingredients in a food processor or blender.  (If you like your sauce chunky, just chop it all fine).  Add tomato mixture to the onions and lower the heat to its lowest setting.  Cook over low heat 40 minutes to an hour.  (Taste it after forty minutes, and keep cooking if it still tastes too raw).  Serve over pasta.

This sauce keeps well, freezes well, can be easily doubled or tripled, and costs a fraction of what jar sauce does.  It's also about a zillion times better. And it takes two dishes and less than ten minutes of active prep time.  What's not to love?


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