My favorite Italian pasta sauce which classically is supposed to be a thick, meaty sauce with a hint of tomatoes. Make sure you have an afternoon to spare, cause simmering this sauce is going to take 4+ hours to thicken the sauce and flavours. If you rush this, it just ends up tasting bland.
INGREDIENTS/
- 3 small carrots
- 4 celery sticks
- 1 large onion
- 5 garlic cloves
- 4 bay leaves
- 2 red chillies
- 2 bunches of parsley
- 2 tetra packs – crushed tomatoes(1000g total)
- panchetta (100g), ground pork(300g), ground beef(300g) (or veal)
- Milk(200ml), red wine(200ml), beef broth(300ml)
- olive oil, sea salt, pepper, paprika, brown sugar
- pasta
PREPPING THE SAUCE/
The magic is in the ‘soffritto‘, done right and the rest is a breeze. Finely dice the carrots, celery, onions, in equal portion set aside. In a pot with a few lugs of olive oil, empty the diced vegetables, crushed garlic cloves, bay leaves, parsley, chillies, and salt. Set on medium/high heat and sautee until the mixture becomes clear, soft and begins to caramelized (approx. 15 mins)
Soffritto ingredients
All diced up really fine, so once cooked it begins to fall apart.
Cooked after 15 minutes, ready to begin adding meat
ADDING THE MEAT/
turn the heat to high add the meat slowly, portion at a time mixing the meat constantly to help evaporate the juices.
Just added in 3/4 all the meat
continuing adding all the meat. cook on high until the meat is all browned, with crispy edges and begins to stick to the pan. Once the meat has begun to crust on the pan edges, deglaze by splashing red wine into the bottom of the pan and scraping the burnt crusties with a wooden spoon and blending into the mixture.
Check the pot, once you see the meat stick to the pan you’re ready to deglaze with the red wine. i might use up to 200ml, use as needed to remove the glaze.
REDUCE AND SIMMER/
reduce the heat to medium/low and add milk to soften the meat. then add entire cans of crushed tomatoes (including the juices), and beef broth, sugar, pepper, salt, safron to taste. simmer for a few hrs.
deglazed and mixed with milk
added tomatoes and broth, time to do some work for a few hours
VARIANTS/
Here is Nobu‘s attempt at making Dennis‘ Bolognaise
finely (chopped as small as possible) diced garlic, carrots, onions, bay leaf, parsley, pre-sliced-dried chillies, salt, and celery, put in a pot with a little bit of oil
heated with constant stirring for about 15 minutes until the pieces became soft
ground pork added little by little with constant stirring at high heat until thoroughly browned
red wine added little by little and reduced; milk and crushed tomatoes added then simmered
consomme broth cubes, paprika, black pepper, salt added and simmering continued with less stirring
bay leaves removed
pasta prepared and cooked to go with the bolognaise sauce
after more simmering and pasta prepared, finally time to put them together
finally served and topped with Parmesan cheese and parsley garnish