Ragù 101

If there’s a single dish, one recipe that above all others expresses exactly what kind of cook I am, this is it.  It’s a simple recipe, just a ragù.  It doesn’t contain many ingredients, there’s no complicated technique or fancy presentation.  Ragù is unhurried and unfussy, and that’s how I like to cook and to eat.  This is a pasta for a grand celebratory feast or a simple Sunday lunch.



My ragù has been a work in progress, born in North Carolina, eating the spaghetti with meat sauce that my Mama used to make.  It took on an Italian-American flavor during my days in New York…thick, garlicky, lots of oregano.  Things really got interesting when I began reading Marcella Hazan, the woman who so ably and generously taught America how to cook real Italian food.  The process Marcella set out in her recipe for Bolognese Meat Sauce is still pretty much how I do it today.





After eating rather a lot of ragù in Italy, my sauce is now very streamlined, distilled to its simplest self.  I don’t look to impose my will upon the ingredients but rather to reveal their essential nature and let them speak for themselves.  This is not Modernist Cuisine.  It’s very direct, personal and, to me at least, powerful.

The aroma of a pot of ragù bubbling gently on the stove returns me immediately to a small piazza in northern Lazio, to a place and time where I was as happy as I’ve ever been in my life.  At the same time, it anchors me firmly in the here and now, one hundred percent present in the kitchen and at the table, cooking for and eating with those I love the most.  This sauce will carry me through to the end of my days.



Audrey says my ragù tastes like Italy and I hope the memory of those sweet Italian summer days is as firmly entrenched in her psyche as it is in mine.  I like to imagine Audrey cooking this ragù for her grandchildren, folding my past into her future and passing along something as sure and true as her beautiful clear blue eyes.





Ragù (Italian Meat Sauce)

Ragù isn’t expensive or particularly difficult but it does require the cook to invest a certain amount of time and attention to the process.  Here are some tips I’ve picked up along the way:

? Italian cooks often add a little something meaty in addition to the beef to round out the flavor and add depth.  This could be a slice or two of pancetta, a few chicken livers or gizzards, an ounce of rehydrated porcini mushrooms or some prosciutto.

? Use a good, heavy pot that retains heat.  I use an enameled cast iron Le Creuset French oven.  An earthenware pot is traditional in Bologna.  Don’t use a skillet.   You want a long, slow evaporation and a skillet would hurry the process undesirably.

? The carrot and celery should be chopped very, very finely so that they melt into the sauce.  This is a good job for the food processor.  Just make sure you don’t process them into pulp.

? I’ll bet you make a wonderful thick, rich, gelatinous chicken, veal or beef stock.  Sorry, but this is not the place for it.  You can use a classic Italian brodo, a light chicken or beef broth, or the liquid that’s left after rehydrating porcini mushrooms.  Honestly, I usually use a porcini stock cube dissolved in water.  It’s been my experience that stock cubes are a staple in Italian pantries and often used when no homemade broth is on hand.  Nothing to be ashamed of, in other words.  Just know that American stock cubes usually contain a lot more sodium than those produced in Italy so if your stock cubes are American-made, start with a little less salt.

? It may seem like it’s taking a long time for first the milk and then the wine to simmer away.  Just be patient, you’ll get there.

? Don’t skimp on the cooking time.  A long, slow simmer is necessary to fully develop the flavor, integrity and power of the sauce. 

? The first choice of pasta to marry to this sauce would be a homemade egg tagliatelle.  If you live in the BVI, Best of British carries a very respectable dried egg tagliatelle.  Pappardelle or fettucine also partner admirably and this is a superb sauce for lasagne.  I’ve eaten ragù in Italy which was tossed to good effect with boxed penne.  Ragù and spaghetti are kind of the Charles and Di of the pasta world…not a happy match.  Don’t do it.

? Please don’t over-sauce your pasta.  This bears repeating.  Please don’t over-sauce your pasta.  This recipe’s worth of ragù will sauce about 2 1/2 to 3 pounds of pasta.  Pasta doesn’t generally like swimming, unless it’s in a nice zuppa.

? Pasta cools down quickly so it’s a good idea to have the serving bowl and pasta plates warm when you’re ready to serve.  And now, let’s cook…

2 tablespoons butter

2 ounces pancetta, finely chopped

1 small onion, finely chopped

2 stalks celery, finely chopped

1/2 carrot, finely chopped

1 1/4 pounds ground beef

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2/3 cup whole milk

1 cup dry white wine

a grating of fresh nutmeg

1 1/2 cups broth

2 tablespoons tomato paste

Put 1 tablespoon of the butter and the pancetta into a heavy pot over medium heat.  Cook and stir for about 5 minutes, until the pancetta begins to take on color and releases some of its fat.  Add the onion to the pot and cook until it becomes translucent, another 5 minutes or so.  Add the carrot and celery and cook for 5 minutes.  Keep stirring all the while.

Turn the heat up to medium-high and add the ground beef, salt and pepper.  Stir well to combine all the ingredients and break up the meat.  Cook until the beef loses its raw color and is just a little bit pink.  Add the milk and cook, stirring occasionally, until the milk is mostly evaporated.  Don’t worry if it looks a little bit curdled when you add the milk.  This is normal and will go away.

Stir in the wine and a little grinding of fresh nutmeg and let things simmer until the wine is also evaporated.  Stir in the broth and tomato paste.  When the sauce begins to simmer, turn the heat down as low as it goes and cook uncovered for at least 3 hours.  4 hours is even better.  Keep the sauce at a very, very low simmer.  Don’t let it boil.  Stir occasionally and try to keep your family away from the pot.  If they’re like mine, they’ll be tasting all the while and can seriously reduce the amount of sauce you end up with.

If the sauce starts to look dry (and it probably will), add 1/4 cup of water.  You may have to do this a few times.  At the end of the cooking time, there should be almost no liquid left and the fat will have separated and floated to the edges of the pot.  Taste for seasoning and add a little salt if necessary.   In a large shallow serving bowl or rimmed platter, toss the ragù together with the remaining tablespoon of butter and the cooked drained pasta of your choice.  Be gentle with the tossing but make sure all the pasta is coated with sauce.  Serve immediately.  Pasta doesn’t wait and cold pasta is sad.  Pass the good Parmesan at the table (I don’t think this pasta really needs cheese, but Audrey would strongly disagree).  Enough sauce for 2 1/2 to 3 pounds of pasta.