Simple Bolognese Sauce Recipe
Look no further, we have the simplest bolognese sauce recipe you’ve been looking for. Although this recipe will require a bit of time to make to ensure the flavours meld together properly, I guarantee you it will require only the most basic ingredients and the flavour will be impactful.
What is Bolognese Sauce?
Bolognese sauce is a classic Italian sauce for pasta made with ground meat, traditionally with beef but it can also be made with ground pork. The sauce also consists of onions, carrots, and celery, and tomatoes cooked slowly over a low heat to help with flavour development. Milk is also added to help give it a more creamy texture.
How to Make Simple Bolognese Sauce
We can break down making this simple bolognese sauce into 3 easy steps below:
- Cook the vegetables and ground beef: Sweat your vegetables over medium heat, and then brown your ground beef.
- Add the milk, wine, and canned tomatoes: Add milk and nutmeg and simmer until evaporated. Add wine and cook until evaporated. Finally, add in your canned tomatoes and crush them as they cook to release all the juices.
- Simmer and Serve: Simmer the sauce uncovered for approximately 3 hours or until the sauce has reduced in half and there’s no more liquid left. Season accordingly and serve with your favourite pasta.
Best types of pasta to serve with this sauce:
Since bolognese is a chunkier/thicker type of sauce, it is best to serve this type of sauce with a thicker type of pasta as this allows the sauce to grip on to the pasta better. See below for our preference:
Rigatoni – Our preference is to serve bolognese sauce with Rigatoni because we love how the meat sauce gets trapped in the tube with this type of pasta. However, since this type of pasta is much larger and less dense (given the tube shape pasta takes up a lot of space on a plate), you will likely need to serve more of this pasta to be full.
Pappardelle – We think serving bolognese with Pappardelle makes your dish look more elevated, mostly because we don’t see pappardelle pasta commonly served in a typical household. It’s also not a common type of pasta that we typically find in a household’s pantry.
Spaghetti – Though this is probably the least ideal type of pasta to serve with this sauce because the noodles are more thin compared to those listed above, it’s the type of pasta that’s most commonly found in a household’s pantry. It works just as well.
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Simple Bolognese Sauce Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil
- 3 tbsp butter
- 1/2 cup chopped onion
- 2/3 chopped celery
- 2/3 cup chopped carrot
- 3/4 lbs ground beef (can also use ground pork)
- salt & freshly ground black pepper to taste
- 1 cup whole milk
- 1/2 tsp nutmeg, freshly grated
- 1 cup dry white wine*
- 1 1/2 cups canned tomatoes, preferably san marzano
- 1 cup fresh basil
- 1 1/4 lbs or 600g of pasta (we prefer spaghetti or rigatoni)
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Instructions
- 1. Add oil, butter, chopped onion into a large pot and cook over medium heat until onions are translucent. Then, add in chopped carrots and celery, cooking for another 2 minutes.
- 2. Add the ground beef and a generous pinch of salt and freshly ground black pepper. Break up the ground beef while cooking and cook until beef has lost its raw, red color.
- 3. Once ground beef is cooked, add the milk and let it simmer gently, stirring frequently, until the milk is mostly evaporated (can take 8-10 minutes). Once the milk has bubbled away, grate in the fresh nutmeg and stir to combine.
- 4. Add the wine and let it simmer, stirring frequently until it has fully evaporated (can take 8-10 minutes), and then add in your tomatoes. Crush the tomatoes with your wooden spoon to help the tomatoes break down and cook more evenly. Once the tomatoes start to bubble, turn the heat down to a low simmer and allow to cook uncovered for up to 3 hours or until most of the liquid from the canned tomatoes has evaporated and you’re left with a thick sauce.
- 5. Once sauce is complete, add salt and pepper according to taste. Do not be afraid to add a lot of salt as we are cooking with a large batch of sauce! Finish the sauce off by adding in 1 cup of fresh basil and stir until the basil has wilted. Toss in cooked drained pasta and serve with freshly grated Parmigianino Reggiano.
