Spagetti Bolognese
Real, proper* bolognese sauce would generally have pancetta, veal or some kind of pork in with the beef mince (hamburger/ground beef), but I get lovely beef from our local farmers’ market, sourced from local aberdeen angus cows, and I like to keep the flavour quite clean. If you’re not so lucky, chuck a handful of pancetta in the pan and brown off before you add the onions.
*In as much as there is any proper recipe for something so traditional. There’s also milk involved and various other complications.
Feeds 4-5
Ingredients
- Beef Mince (low fat, steak mince)
- 2 Medium Onions, Diced
- 1-2 Garlic Cloves, Minced
- 2tsp Dried Oregano (it’s more flavourful dried, so if you have fresh, use more)
- 2tsp Dried Basil (or about half that of fresh)
- 2 Stalks of Celery, finely sliced
- 2 Medium Carrots, finely diced
- 400g/14oz Can Chopped/Crushed Tomatoes (or equivalent)
- 2tbsp Tomato Puree
Method
Gently saute the onion in a little olive oil, cooking over a low heat and stirring regularly so it doesn’t burn or stick. Add the carrot, celery and garlic and cook slowly, stirring often, until they are softened.
If the mince is low fat then add it straight into the onions, if it isn’t then remove the onions to a bowl, brown the mince and pour off the fat before re-adding the onions, celery, carrot and garlic.
Add the herbs, tomatoes and tomato puree, and cook down over a medium heat stirring regularly until thickened and smelling gorgeous.
Serve with spagetti, over a baked potato or with any pasta you can scrounge up with a light blizzard of freshly grated/shredded parmesan over the top. If you don’t have fresh parmesan it’s better to use cheddar or some other sharp cheese than it is to use one of those tubs of dessicated, foot-smelling dust. Will keep in the fridge for a week or freeze like a dream; just nuke for 2-3 minutes to reheat.
chris said,
March 23, 2010 @ 10:50 am
Interested to see how much onion you use – and how finely chopped. I like to add a slurp of red wine to mine ….
FuzzySteve said,
March 23, 2010 @ 11:06 am
Bah! Too many vegetables
Then again, mine’s meat meat and more meat. Pack of unsmoked streaky bacon, finely chopped in a food processor, fried with herbs and the garlic. Then add some chopped onion. Then pork mince and beef/steak mince (500-800g of each)
Brown it off, before adding red wine (1/3rd of a bottle should do). boil off the alcohol, then add finely chopped tomatos (2 cans), and tomato puree (150g or so).
Maybe add some worchester sauce to taste for umami. Maybe an oxo cube or similar
Wenchie said,
March 23, 2010 @ 11:39 am
@Chris I like onion – actually it’s probably a hangover from being a student, onions are cheap
. As for the red wine, well yes, but that would require me to have some undrunk open wine in the house…
@Steve – you’ll get scurvey and your legs will fall off bro :p . Actually, I bet yours tastes gorgeous (although Oxo Cube? REALLY?) and definitely sounds like an “even better the next day” contender.
Lorraine @NotQuiteNigella said,
March 23, 2010 @ 1:13 pm
I’m convinced that nothing beats a homemade spaghetti bolognese!
Emily said,
March 24, 2010 @ 3:09 am
I agree, bacon adds extra tastiness, and I have used red wine a lot in the past (until I no longer had a bottle around, heh).
What I like to do is once the meat is browned, add the tomatoes and tomato paste (and a bay leaf), and a couple of cups of stock. Then I simmer it down for at least an hour – until it’s thick instead of watery. Everything goes very tender and tasty, it infuses it with that day-old flavour from the get-go
Wenchie said,
March 24, 2010 @ 8:45 am
@Lorraine, absolutely – it’s one of those things that just “taste of home”
@Emily I would say I was the same with the wine, but you’ve been in my kitchen, so… hrm. I HAVE been the same with wine. Sometimes
. Ooh, I do the same boiling down thing with chilli, and it works wonderfully (it’s particularly good shoved in the slow cooker for a billionty hours) but I’d never thought to do with with bolognese, which is a bit dim 
chris said,
March 26, 2010 @ 9:30 am
I keep a wine box for just this kind of thing ….;-)