45 minutes
Marcella Hazan’s Bolognese Sauce
- Yield 2 heaping cups, for about 6 servings and 1 1/2 pounds pasta
- Time At least 4 hours
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Jim Wilson/The New York Times
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
- 3 tablespoons butter plus 1 tablespoon for tossing the pasta
- ½ cup chopped onion
- ⅔ cup chopped celery
- ⅔ cup chopped carrot
- ¾ pound ground beef chuck (or you can use 1 part pork to 2 parts beef)
- Salt
- Black pepper, ground fresh from the mill
- 1 cup whole milk
- Whole nutmeg
- 1 cup dry white wine
- 1 ½ cups canned imported Italian plum tomatoes, cut up, with their juice
- 1 ¼ to 1 ½ pounds pasta
- Freshly grated parmigiano-reggiano cheese at the table
Preparation
- Put the oil, butter and chopped onion in the pot and turn the heat on to medium. Cook and stir the onion until it has become translucent, then add the chopped celery and carrot. Cook for about 2 minutes, stirring vegetables to coat them well.
- Add ground beef, a large pinch of salt and a few grindings of pepper. Crumble the meat with a fork, stir well and cook until the beef has lost its raw, red color.
- Add milk and let it simmer gently, stirring frequently, until it has bubbled away completely. Add a tiny grating -- about 1/8 teaspoon -- of nutmeg, and stir.
- Add the wine, let it simmer until it has evaporated, then add the tomatoes and stir thoroughly to coat all ingredients well. When the tomatoes begin to bubble, turn the heat down so that the sauce cooks at the laziest of simmers, with just an intermittent bubble breaking through to the surface. Cook, uncovered, for 3 hours or more, stirring from time to time. While the sauce is cooking, you are likely to find that it begins to dry out and the fat separates from the meat. To keep it from sticking, add 1/2 cup of water whenever necessary. At the end, however, no water at all must be left and the fat must separate from the sauce. Taste and correct for salt.
- Toss with cooked drained pasta, adding the tablespoon of butter, and serve with freshly grated Parmesan on the side.
Cooking Notes
Rob Ron
At the end of the cooking process am I to remove the separated fat. I'm new to this.
3273 This is helpful
Kim
I cannot comment of the taste of the sauce. It was cooling and I ran a short errand. In the meantime, my 8 year old Labrador Retriever, Jake, (who had never, ever bothered anything in the kitchen) somehow got the pot off of the cooktop and ate all of the sauce. The worst part was that I had tripled the recipe, so Jake ate 3 pounds of Bolognese sauce! I am certain he would rate the sauce a 5. We had to go out for dinner, but I will make the recipe again and post relevant feedback!PS Jake is fine.
2499 This is helpful
Andrew from New York
This was a great and helpful guide. Added a few bits more here, reduced a few things there and ended up with a great bolognese.
I have to laugh at the people who are complaining about it not being good. You're saying that you had something on your stove top for 3 hours and not once did you taste it? This is cooking not baking. You taste everything at every step along the way and make adjustments. It is the lazy cook that blames the recipe
I have to laugh at the people who are complaining about it not being good. You're saying that you had something on your stove top for 3 hours and not once did you taste it? This is cooking not baking. You taste everything at every step along the way and make adjustments. It is the lazy cook that blames the recipe
1193 This is helpful
Mark
I've been making this sauce for 25 years. It comes out great every time. I can say that it works with ground beef or a mixture of beef, pork and/or veal. I can also say that this sauce is 97.32% as good after 1 hour as it is after 3 hours, so if you're impatient. Noting that it takes about 1 hour to get to step 4, so if you started cooking a bit late, when you get to step 4, you can eat it with minimal reduction in quality after one hour of cooking.
938 This is helpful
Maria
I have the 1979 version of the book. The proportions of ingredients in my cookbook are very different.
For 3/4 lb of beef, go with:
3 tbs each - olive oil and butter
2 tbs each chopped onion, celery and carrot
1/2 c milk
2 c canned Italian tomatoes, roughly chopped.
My recipe calls for adding the wine and cooking off, before adding the milk.
I always make a triple or quadruple recipe. I cut down on the amount of butter/oil I use - never more than 4-6 tbs of each. It freezes well.
For 3/4 lb of beef, go with:
3 tbs each - olive oil and butter
2 tbs each chopped onion, celery and carrot
1/2 c milk
2 c canned Italian tomatoes, roughly chopped.
My recipe calls for adding the wine and cooking off, before adding the milk.
I always make a triple or quadruple recipe. I cut down on the amount of butter/oil I use - never more than 4-6 tbs of each. It freezes well.
715 This is helpful
Linda
This the the best Bolognese recipe there is in my opinion. Btw... Ground chuck is 80/20 ground beef. That is also known as 80%. Any leaner beef and the sauce would not be correct. We do not find it too fatty in the least. You need the butter and whole milk for this sauce to be the way it is supposed to be. Using turkey and skim milk might give you a tasty end result, but it is not Marcella's sauce. As far as I am concerned this recipe is perfect as written . No changes necessary.
476 This is helpful
Lorraine
I am making this right now and it is going great. I really just wanted to say that I love the expression, "laziest of simmers".
444 This is helpful
Patricia Garcia
Marcella hailed from the Northern Adriatic coast, where seafood was the most commonly available. She only learned to cook after she was married, trying to please Victor, who was and is an oenophile. She was a gifted cook. I wonder how many of the complainers bothered with the nutmeg...it is the most defining flavor in a true Bolognese sauce, which this most definitely is
397 This is helpful
Brian T Hunt
Authentic. Using a broad, flat noodle such as parpadelle is essential. Chop the vegetables pretty fine- they seem to disappear, but are actually part of the chunks in the ragu. The tip about using a little butter and a little starchy pasta water to toss the sauce with the pasta is also important. And spring for the real Parmesan-Reggiano- desecrating a five-hour ragu with stuff from the green can would not only be disastrously counter-productive and sad, but borderline immoral. :)
397 This is helpful
Charlie
I've been making this for over 30 years. I cook it exactly for 5 hours. The difference in the taste when you cook it for 3 hours (more bland) and 5 hours is incredible and well worth the time. It ends up being a thick, concentrated sauce that you don't pour on top of the pasta but that you toss into the pasta.
372 This is helpful
Max
Holy goodness. I'm amazed at the number of people who are absolutely sure that the version of Bolognese that they prefer is the one, true, authentic version. I imagine there are as many variations as there are kitchens in Bologna, folks.
If I could add anything to the conversation, it would be to throw a little starchy pasta water in with the sauce and pasta as they are being tossed together, and really bring it all together.
If I could add anything to the conversation, it would be to throw a little starchy pasta water in with the sauce and pasta as they are being tossed together, and really bring it all together.
304 This is helpful
Creggio
Marcella has never never let me down. No exception here. If you have had less than a satisfactory result, less thaN a religious experience, try this:
1. Do what she says—EXACTLY.
2. Tell Alexa to play Puccini or Verdi
3. Use the heavy bottom pot.
4. Do NOTHING to make any step happen more quickly.
7. Don’t deviate from her instructions.
You will have a different result. Tanti saluti.
293 This is helpful
marcolius
I've made this sauce many times, and I like it for what it is. I love to doctor things, too, but sometimes a classic is a classic. That being said, I would add two observations:
-Fresh, blanched, peeled, and chopped tomatoes work well, too. Lean toward longer cooking time. Haven't needed to add water when using fresh.
-I finely mince the vegetables, particularly the carrot and celery. Otherwise, it has a "beef stew" appearance that my family finds less appealing.
-Fresh, blanched, peeled, and chopped tomatoes work well, too. Lean toward longer cooking time. Haven't needed to add water when using fresh.
-I finely mince the vegetables, particularly the carrot and celery. Otherwise, it has a "beef stew" appearance that my family finds less appealing.
263 This is helpful
m
Oh goodness no! Fear not the fat! Fear the pasta more.
252 This is helpful
Margie Mayhem
Did you leave the lid on while cooking?
249 This is helpful
anne
Marcella Hazan's recipe for ragù is a total classic,easy to make and freezes perfectly.I use veal and do not add any milk,I add two leaves of alloro (bay leaf) which her original recipe has.Canned tomatoes should be put through a tomato passer to get out the seeds which make a sauce bitter and best of all use San Marzano canned tomatoes if you can (they should be from the "Agro Sarnese Nocerino DOP" with numbers on the label, otherwise they are not real San Marzano tomatoes)...
224 This is helpful
Amanda
No; it's just a signal that it's finished cooking ("ready to eat"). When sauce cooks long enough that the fat separates it 1) improves the taste of the ingredients, and 2) improves the appearance of the dish. Separated fat looks and tastes beautiful in a dish--it often takes on the deepest colors and flavors in the pot, and is one measure that separates an amateur's dish from a professional's. So, yes! The fat is meant to stay in the pot!
220 This is helpful
Brian Dear
The best suggestion is to not use low-fat meat. It's a meat sauce and thus the meat is the most critical component. The fat reacts with the milk and the wine -- reducing the fat content reduces the ability for the chemical reactions to happen.
This recipe is all about the fat and the reactions with the acidity of the tomatoes, the alcohol in the wine and the sugars in the vegetables along with the enzymes in the milk.
This recipe is all about the fat and the reactions with the acidity of the tomatoes, the alcohol in the wine and the sugars in the vegetables along with the enzymes in the milk.
206 This is helpful
AZ
Delicious - here are my tips: doubled recipe (cooks down a lot), used 1.5 lbs of beef/pork/veal blend, used 2 28 oz cans of plum tomatos, chopped up (closer to 4 cups) and also threw in the juice from one can. I discarded the juice from the other. This was the perfect amount for some extra flavor. I cooked for 5.5 hours - this sauce REALLY needed time. I left a lot of time between each layer (milk, wine, tomatoes) - upwards of 30 min each. It looked weird until about 4 hours in. So perfect!
187 This is helpful
Annie
Marcella was the queen of Italian Cooking, I learned to cook from her when I was a bride and there is not one of her recipes that have failed me. This one is a regular around our house; occasionally instead of ground pork I will use Italian sausage removed form its casing for added flavor. So, between Marcella and Julia, I turned out to be a pretty good cook, and now with NYTimes Cooking I am still learning and improving.
156 This is helpful
Kevin
The order in which you add the wine and milk is a major difference between the original recipe and the one Marcella published in her single volume Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking. I prefer the original recipe, wine first then milk.
125 This is helpful
Uneelle
Sorry, but it's not the least bit surprising that substituting turkey for beef (or preferably beef and pork) led to a disappointing outcome. Turkey has very little flavor and even less fat (fat = flavor!). Outcome is destined to be bland.
115 This is helpful
Marylouise
Most Americans are convinced that "Italian" food means red gravy with lots of mozzarella and ricotta. That is really "Italian American" food. Italy has many regions and most Italian American food is based on southern Italian food (where the majority of Italian immigrants came from). Marcella is more of northern Italian cook. And her Bolognese is the best.
110 This is helpful
Jdsans
wanted to add something to my review from a couple days ago. My observation is that something magic happens after hour 4 of the final cooking phase. That's when the flavors deepen. You taste it a couple hours earlier, and you think, "ok, but I don't see what all the fuss is about." However, after hour 4 is when you taste it and you don't really have words, just sounds to describe it. Your knees might even buckle a little.
105 This is helpful
Kevin Fisher
I've made Marcella's bolognese many times and it's great, but if I had to choose my favorite bolognese it would definitely be Alice Waters'! Forgive me Marcella fans. Here it is: http://lakelurecottagekitchen.com/2014/02/03/alice-waters-bolognese-sauc...
72 This is helpful
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For example: “Made for Alex's birthday. Next time double the recipe.”
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