by Ethan Johnson
February 10, 2004
At long last, I am coughing up the recipe that put me on the map.
Just in time for Valentine's Day, I bring you:
Tagliatelle Bolognese
Note: Originally seen in Cooking Essentials by Mary Berry and Marlena Spieler. As per usual, this gets the EJ treatment, so it's mine, mine all mine.
1lb Ground Round OR ground turkey (don't get "chuck" or whatever)
1lb Tagliatelle (or, fettuccini if nobody carries Tagliatelle near you)
2 medium white or yellow onions, diced
Garlic (2 to 8 cloves, depending on taste, minced)
1 carrot, peeled
1 celery stalk (heart), trimmed
1 can (14 oz) Diced tomatoes
1/2 small can tomato paste
1 can (14 oz) beef stock
Red cooking wine
1 tbsp white flour
Ground nutmeg
Salt & Pepper to taste
Butter
Olive oil
(Serves 4.)
Update 2/13/2007: This recipe is now available in video format.
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We begin by dicing the onions into a medium-sized bowl. For those of you who have been watching the Food Network for months on end and are finally having a go at actually cooking, I am here to tell you (as a recovering viewer) that you really just need one bowl for the veggies. Seriously. Then again, it's your party, so if you bought 800 of those "bam" cups, who am I to ruin your investment?
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Dice up the carrot and the celery and dump them into the bowl.
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Use a garlic press and mash out 2-8 cloves of garlic, depending on your personal preference. Scrape the garlic onto the top of the ingredients in the bowl.
Why: When you go to dump the ingredients into the pot (see next step), the garlic will cleanly fall out of the bowl, followed closely by everything else. Neat, huh?
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Now it's time to haul out your prized Le Creuset pot that you use for everything. And if you are of the less fortunate (snort), then use whatever it is that you mere mortals use these days for such things. (Circulon™ cookware for sale cheap, inquire within)
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Next, pour about 2 tbsp of olive oil into the pot. Turn on the stove burner to medium heat.
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Once the oil has heated up a bit, add roughly 2 tbsp of butter and melt it into the oil.
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Once the oil and butter are heated and ready, dump the carrot, onion, garlic, and celery into the pot. Turn the heat down to low.
Stir the vegetables constantly for about 5 minutes, until softened but not brown.
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Add the meat, breaking it up with a wooden spoon (I prefer a wooden spatula, as I can really chop the meat up that way). Stir and break up the meat until it loses its redness.
Here is the meat, browning nicely:
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Once the meat is browned, add in the tbsp of flour and mix together well.
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Add the tomatoes and beef stock (broth). Scoop out a little less than half of a can of tomato paste and add to the pot. Add a few shakes of ground nutmeg to the pot. Add salt and pepper as desired. Stir everything together thoroughly.
Note: You *could* add 1/2 cup of beef broth (stock) and 1/2 cup of red cooking wine. I have found that it makes little or no difference either way when it comes time to dig in to the end result. If you're going for snob appeal (et l'amour) then do the wine thing. Or, leave it next to the stove and let the power of psychological association work for you as you, eh, add the beef broth. But the place will STINK of wine, won't it? Because you had the bottle next to the stove! It must be in there! Oh, honey! How classy is dinner tonight?
(Translation: It's our secret if you left the wine out.)
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Bring the pot to a boil, stirring constantly.
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Reduce the heat down to really low (like you're cooking rice). Cover the pot just enough so that steam can still escape.
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Cook the sauce for 1 hour, stirring once every 15 minutes to make sure nothing sticks to the bottom. It generally doesn't anyway, but it keeps you busy whilst waiting to eat.
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Right around the 30 minute mark, start boiling the pasta water. It's OK if the pasta boiling part of this goes over the alotted 60 minutes for the sauce, as longer cooking = bigger taste. For the sauce, not the pasta.
Ideally, you have access to tagliatelle in your neck of the woods. If you are unsure, it looks like this:
Note the "nest" shape of the pasta. This is NOT fettuccini. But, you can substitute it (or even spaghetti if you like) as needed.
Also, I have found Delverde™ (Main page) to be the best brand I have tried so far. Ask your grocer to carry it, or shop online and get some if you've never had it before. Just sayin', I'm not shilling for anyone here.
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Once the pasta has been boiled and drained, put the noodles into a serving bowl.
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The sauce will be thick and glossy. However, please note that this is not ye olde "spaghetti sauce" and it will run thinner than say, Prego™ or whatever.
Pour the sauce over the noodles and serve. For an added nice touch, sprinkle some fresh parmesan cheese with a rotary grater over each individual serving.
Don't forget garlic bread!
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Mangia!
Enjoy! Let me know how it turns out. <EM>
