You don’t have to have culinary skill, you simply have to have time to pull off this iconic Italian classic at the heart of so many fallacies and misconceptions.
This is my personal recipe, passed to me by my father—who learned it from an elderly lady from Bologna who had settled in NYC— and "perfected" in my own way for the perfect beef (and veggie versions) ragù, that much maligned sauce at the heart of the "Bolognese" debate but so loved the world over. Comfort food and a crowd-pleaser, you really can't afford to be without this one in your culinary arsenal.
Overall, this recipe makes the ideal ragù (“bolognese”) for...
● 3 to 4 adult main courses
● A family of four e.g. two adults and two younger kids
● 2 x adult main course + 2 x hearty adult lunches
For those who prefer a less sauce-to-pasta ratio in the traditional Italian style, it goes even further. Whilst you can theoretically “halve” or “double up” on quantities, having cooked it again and again over the years, I do believe that it works best cooked at these quantities in this manner, perhaps trialled on large Italian families over many decades.
Shopping list
* indicates optional ingredients
Approx 4 to 5 tablespoons of olive oil, ideally extra virgin
500g minced lean beef or finely cubed beef if you wish for the more “authentic” Bologna-style ragù. It also works perfectly well with 500g of quorn or soya mince (defrosted). It also works well to make up the 500g total doing a “mix ‘n match” of vegetable protein and meat if you’re cutting down on red meat flexitarian-stylee. I have only cooked it once with lab-grown meat—and it was fine. But it’s totally crap if you try other veggie substitutes such as lentils or chickpeas.
Three to four cloves of garlic, very finely chopped or crushed—despite all the Italian fetishisation of garlic, I can’t honestly say that one works better than the other *
One very large or two medium-sized onions; cubed —white or brown are better than red
One large pepper; cubed —red or yellow, ideally, not green unless you prefer a more bitter undertone
500g of Italian passata OR 500g of finely diced canned Italian plum tomatoes. NOT fresh Italian plum tomatoes.
3 to 4 tablespoons of tomato purée — roughly a 142g concentrate tin or from a tube
1 vegetable or beef stock cube or “jelly”— knock yourself out if you want fresh stock but I can’t say it makes a huge difference. Plain or with Italian herbs; avoid French Provencal-style or other herbs
1 large glass of red wine (yes, red!) or a standard size glass of red port ( a deeper flavour). This recipe is ideal for getting rid of the remnants of a bottle of red wine that you don’t want to drink—it doesn’t have to be in prime or drinkable condition*
3 tablespoons of traditional mushroom ketchup*
2 standard “squares” of plain dark chocolate, minimum 70% cocoa
Herbs to flavour*
A small quantity of fresh lemon zest to taste, very finely grated*
Cooking method
Place a deep saucepan roughly 20cm in diameter with a lid on a high heat, heating the olive oil, ensuring it is spread evenly across the bottom of the saucepan
When the olive oil is hot, add the garlic, stirring vigorously. Add the chopped onions and sweat, covering the pot, stirring regularly to prevent sticking or charring.
When the onions are soft but before browning/caramelising, stir in the chopped pepper, sweating it; stir frequently. When the onions and pepper have completely softened but before they become too brown/caramelised, add the (minced) beef (or Quorn/soy mince).
Keep stirring to ensure that the meat/protein is fully coated. If necessary, add additional olive oil to seal all ingredients. Alternate replacing the lid and allowing the ingredients to sweat with regular stirring to prevent sticking
While doing this, boil the kettle with enough water to fill your 500g bottle/carton of passata or tomato can. Pour the passata into the pot. Stir vigorously and slowly pour in the wine/port. Replace the lid, allowing the ingredients to boil vigorously.
Place the stock cube/jelly into the empty passata bottle/carton or tomato can. Spoon the tomato purée into the carton/jar/can. When the kettle boils, pour the water into the jar/carton/can, mixing the purée and stock into the liquid until the carton/jar/can is filled with stock-purée liquid. Carefully empty the liquid into the pot.
Replace the lid and allow the ingredients to come to the boil. Allow it to boil vigorously at a high heat for 15 to 20 mins, occasionally removing the lid to stir and prevent sticking.
After 15 to 20 mins of boiling, turn down the heat —settings often vary, but this is often around the “2” mark—replace the lid and allow it to cook on a lower temperature for a further 2.5 hours, stirring every 15 to 20 mins, preventing sticking. The liquid should “bubble” gently. If not, gradually increase the heat until it does with the lid on the saucepan. Conversely, reduce the heat if it is boiling too violently.
After about 1 hour, add the particular herbs/spices you prefer and the mushroom ketchup if you are using it. For a “fresher” taste, opt for chopped basil or flat-leaf parsley to flavour; for a “heavier” flavour, use oregano. Black pepper is traditional. But, I only cook with “passive salting” for this dish: the salt from the ingredients and the water in which the pasta is cooked. So it needs no additional salt etc.
If the dish is cooking too quickly or becomes dry and sticks to the pot, simply add water( about a quarter of a cup at a time) and stir it in, ensuring that it is hot enough to “bubble” on the surface of the ingredients
After 3.25 hours of slow cooking, you should have a fairly thick ragù with a little rich, “oily” liquid concentrated at the edges of the pot. If it still seems “too liquid”, remove the lid and allow it to bubble for longer until it reduces appropriately
Approx. 25 mins before serving, grate the chocolate and/or lemon rind into the pot with a fine grater; stir thoroughly and allow to simmer
Delicious variations
These are variations I can thoroughly recommend. In any combination, you can add:
● Fresh or frozen green peas
● Spinach (but it should be really finely chopped, whether fresh or frozen)
● Unsmoked raw bacon; cubed with the fat on
● Smoked mussels
Using white wine. Okay, so no doubt many of you will have come across this old Italian "rule" that you always use white wine when cooking with tomatoes; something to do with the acidity balancing out. My father was always very clear that the woman who taught him this recipe insisted on red wine because, apparently, the result had better prodezza sessuale. But, hey, your choice...
If opting for bacon, add it at least 30min before the end of the cooking time; all of the others
approx. 15min before serving.
This summer variation below is served Bologna-style with tagliatelle. It has a lot of sliced mushrooms in it (added at the same time as the peppers) and spinach (added only about 15mins before serving). Rather than opting for a wine, it was delicious with a domestic Italian beer.
The Pasta
This is a sauce that is great with most pastas. Traditionally it is served with tagliatelle, while
I personally love it with bucatini. It’s naturally the perfect comfort food as “spag bog” with
spaghetti but really any pasta will do. And, of course, it makes a killer lasagne.
For the Keto kids, I personally think it works better with spiralised butternut than courgettes.
If opting for the “courgetti”, make sure you thoroughly drain all excess liquid off the spiralised courgettes before adding the ragù when serving.
Saving it for later
This sauce is perfect for storing in the fridge for use within a couple of days but also freezes
perfectly for later use and/or microwave reheating. Simply allow it to full cool at room
temperature then decant to the appropriate storage container as required.
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