Ragù alla Bolognese

​After 4 hours of slow cooking, the final product is incredibly rich in flavour and beautifully tender. The preparation takes around 15-20 minutes. The rest of the time is for you to have a glass of wine while you wait for the smell of ragù to fill the whole house. 

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Serves: 10

Ingredients

• 500g of good quality beef mince 
• 400g of good quality pork mince 
• 150g of pancetta 
• 50g of celery 
• 50g of carrots 
• 100g of onions
• 400g can of San Marzano tomatoes 
• 200g of red wine
• 1,5Lt of vegetable stock 
• Salt 
• 5 bay leaves

Method

1. Start by chopping the pancetta into 1 cm cubes and thinly dice onions, carrots and celery. 
2. Bring a large pot on a medium hit. Add the pancetta with a tbsp of extra virgin olive oil. The pancetta will start to release the fat and get a little brown. At this point add the soffritto, diced onions, carrots and celery. Sweat the soffritto for around 10/15 minutes on a medium heat, stirring often. 
3. Add the pork mince and beef mince to the pot. Keep stirring and prodding for at least 5 minutes, until all the mince is in uniform, mince-sized lumps and there are no more pink bits. Make sure you keep the heat hot enough for the meat to fry and become brown, rather than just stew.
4. Add the wine and let it evaporate on a high heat for around 5 minutes so the acidity of the wine cooks off.  Add the San Marzano tomato along with the bay leaves and half of the vegetable stock. Stir well. 
5. Place a wooden spoon over the top of the pot on one side and cover the pot with the lid. The wooden spoon will stop the lid from closing and allowing a bit of steam to escape and the ragù to reduce slowly. Let the ragù simmer on a low heat for around 2 hours, checking the ragù and giving it a nice stir every 40 minutes.   
6. After 2 hours some of the liquids should have evaporated from ragù. Add the rest of your stock and let it simmer again for another 2 hours. Your ragù should be ready after this 4 hour period, the sauce should be thick, moist and juicy. If it results still liquid continue cooking it for longer.  Try the ragù and adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper. 
7. Let the ragù rest and cool down in the pot for 30 minutes. The ragù can stay in the fridge up to 3 days or it can be freeze up to 3 months. The ragù it will taste even better from the day after you make it as this will have cool down properly overnight and the flavours will have combine all together making a very tasty ragù!
8. Follow this recipe to serve the ragù with homemade tagliatelle.  Top it with parmesan and a drizzle of good extra virgin olive oil. Enjoy! 

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