Toscano ham

Minced toscano ham

Celery carrot and onion

Minced beef meat

Minced ham

Concentrated tomato paste

Ragù

With gramigna… enjoy!

Ragu bolognese, or simply ragù or bolognese sauce, is one of the most known recipes from Italy, but also one of the most abused. This for two main reasons:

it is not easy to find a good ragu bolognese abroad (I would say almost impossible, to be honest)

they often serve it in the wrong way. I will never stress enough how in Bologna we will never serve spaghetti with ragù (and if some restaurants do, change place immediately!). Spaghetti with ragù don’t exist, and the real recipe from Bologna for spaghetti… is with a tuna based sauce! The reason is very simple: ragù requires a kind of pasta that is not smooth, otherwise it cannot stick to the pasta itself. Spaghetti are perfect for tomato sauce, for pesto alla genovese, but please forget them if you want to taste ragù.

Ragu bolognese is actually a quite simple recipe, it just takes… time! And one ingredient that can be tough to find abroad, but that I link below.

When you will have your ragu bolognese ready, you can put it into the freezer in small boxes and use it for quick but “soooo Italian” dinners with your guests. Amazing as a sauce for tagliatelle or gramigna, it can be used to prepare true bolognese lasagne, but also as a sauce with any kind of pasta (of course ribbed, never smooth, otherwise ragù will stay in the plate… just like with spaghetti).

But now… let’s go with the food!

Overview

Serves: about a dozen. (Note: usually I list ingredients for 4 people, but since ragù preparation takes long hours, you will prefer bigger quantities to always have some portions in your freezer)

Difficulty: easy

Time: about 4.5 hours, but little effort needed.

Ingredients

1000 g minced beef meat

150 g Tuscany ham (or bacon). My mom uses Tuscany ham, traditional recipe has bacon instead, so if it is easier for you to find bacon…use it 🙂

30 – 50 g butter

1 table spoon extra virgin olive oil (aka EVO). This is optional, my mom uses this one: https://amzn.to/2FIRB0t

half carrot, half small celery stick, half small onion

concentrated tomato paste. In Bologna we have a standard, that is double, or even triple, concentrated by Mutti: https://amzn.to/2AMWFxs

1 glass of water

salt according to taste.

Note: for conversions, please refer to an online converter, like https://bit.ly/2PqeJ9S

Directions

Start finely chopping the onion, celery and carrot. In the meanwhile, warm the butter (about 30 g) and some EVO, then gently fry them for about 10 – 15 minutes until they brown. What you obtain so far is what we call a “soffritto” (fun fact: in bolognese dialect, soffritto is also the name for the ragù itself!).

If you buy ham (or bacon) in thick slices, like I always do, grind them, so you can add the minced meat later, during the preparation.

When the soffritto is ready, add the minced beef meat and make it gently fry for about 40 minutes.

After this, add the minced ham and make it gently fry for about 40 minutes.

After this, add the concentrated tomato paste (see picture above for the quantity). If you want a more vivid red color, add a little bit more, but always remember that bolognese ragù is not based on tomato (like the sauces from Southern Italy, e.g. Naples). Add a pinch of salt, according to taste, and one glass of water, then cover the pot and let it boil at very low heat for an additional 3 hours. During this time, if you think the sauce is getting dry, add some butter. And…

Buon appetito!

Suggested wine pairings

The perfect wine pairing for a pasta (e.g. tagliatelle) with bolognese sauce is a Sangiovese. For this pairing, see also the review of a lunch at Trattoria nonna Aurora. A good advice is always to pair food with a wine produced in the same area, so I suggest an excellent Sangiovese di Romagna (near Bologna).

Ragu bolognese FAQ