Recipe: Italian Traditional Spaghetti Bolognese

Ingredients

• 250 g minced lean beef
• 250 g minced pork
• 60 ml olive oil
• 6 slices of smoked bacon, chopped or pancetta
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 2 carrots, finely diced
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 celery stalks, finely diced
• 400 g tin of crushed tomatoes
• 200 g tomato purée
• 120 ml red wine
• 1 tsp oregano
• 2 tbsp parsley, chopped
• salt and pepper
• 500 g spaghetti
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 25 g parmesan, grated
• 2 large saucepans

Instructions

Step 1

Preheat the oven to 180C (350F) or gas mark 4.

Step 2

Place a medium pan at high heat, and warm it through. then add the olive oil and the bacon bits. Stir with your wooden spoon.
When the bacon has rendered, it means that the fat has melted, start to add beef, little by little stir each time to break the meat up and help it brown. Allow it to cook for several minutes.

Step 3

TIP:
put the meat in little by little, make sure your pan will not cool down, therefore cooking the meat evenly.
After a few minutes, add pork, again adding little by little and stir well each time. Allow it to cook for a few minutes.
When the meat is thoroughly cooked and separated add the onion, carrots, celery and garlic. Combine well and let it all cook for a few minutes, stirring occasionally.
Add the tomato purée, mixing it in well. After a few minutes stir in the wine and cook for several minutes allowing it to evaporate.
Then stir in the chopped tomatoes and turn the heat off. Season with oregano, salt and pepper and give it a good final stir. It is now ready to bake.

Step 4

Place the pan in the centre of the preheated oven, and depending on the size of your pot cook for roughly 1 to 1.5 hours.
By baking the dish in the oven ensures that it will stew nicely in it is own juices and caramelize, as it has very little liquid and will not burn by cooking from the heat underneath. It is important that during the cooking process you stir the sauce from time to time to make sure that no part of it is burning.

Step 5

When there are 20 minutes before the sauce is done, season a pan of boiling water with salt. add spaghetti, push spaghetti gently down into the water, add 1 tbsp of olive oil and let it boil.
Every pasta has a different cooking time, it would better check the instructions on the back of the package, rough cook time is 7 to 10 minutes.

Step 6

Take the pan out from the oven after roughly 1-1.5 hours, when the majority of liquid has been absorbed.

Step 7

Put the pasta into a colander, drain it in the sink. Place a pot below the colander to catch extra liquid.

Step 8

If using the pasta right a way there is no need to wash the pasta but if it's going to be used later do wash it and mix a little olive oil into it.

Step 9

Put spagetti into a serving bowl with your tongs. Place the sauce equally on the top, garnish with some chopped parsley and a sprinkle of parmesan cheese. Your dish is ready to serve. It would better serve hot with a glass of red wine.