Pasta Bolognese

Yet another great recipe from Cook’s Illustrated!   Although not exact, as I left the onions out and I couldn’t find dried porchini mushrooms (I used 1 ounce of regular mushrooms) and instead of whole milk I used 2%.  It was delicious!

But first since Joe came over we decided to go out to eat at our local Mexican restaurant.  Can you guess that Hannah drove?!

Here’s what I ordered:

I only ate about 5 tortilla chips at the table, all of the beef taco, half of the enchilada and just a couple spoonfuls of the beans and rice.

So after lunch we came home and I worked on my grocery list and menu.  I went a little over our weekly budget of $100 (only by $26) but I stocked up on chicken broth and had to get garbage bags.   I think it will be a great menu – you’ll just have to come back each night to see what I make!

My cool find though was these tiny peppers!  Only $2.50 for this whole bag!

Pasta Bolognese

• 1 ounce cleaned mushrooms
• 1 1/4 cup sweet white wine (I used a chardonnay and really probably will skip this step the next time, couldn’t really taste it!)
• 1/4 cup carrot
• 3 ounces pancetta
• 1 1/2 tablespoons butter
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 28 ounce can whole tomatoes, with juice
• 1 1/4 pound meatloaf mix (pork, veal and beef)
• 1 1/2 cups 2% milk
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste (oops!  I forgot this!)
• salt and pepper to taste

Bring wine to simmer in dutch oven over medium heat; reduce heat to low and simmer until wine is reduced to 2 tablespoons, about 20 minutes, remove to small dish and set aside.

Meanwhile, put the carrots and mushrooms in a food processor and mince.  Set aside.

Pulse the pancetta in the food processor and mince.  Set aside.

Pulse tomatoes until pureed.  Set aside.

Heat butter in dutch oven and add pancetta and cook  until browned, about 3 minutes. Add the carrot and mushroom mixture and cook until softened, about 5 minutes.  Add garlic and sugar and cook for 30 seconds.  Add meat mixture and cook for 1 minute, breaking up the meat.  Add milk and stir to continue to break up the meat and summer for about 18 minutes. 

Stir in tomato paste (oops – this is the part I forgot!) and cook for 1 minute.  Add tomatoes and salt and pepper to taste.  Bring to a simmer over medium-high heat, then reduce to medium and simmer until the liquid is reduced and starts to thicken, about 20 minutes.  This sauce will still still be pretty “watery” but the flavor was amazing.  Even Hannah who doesn’t like sauce and meat ate it!  While it was cooking she kept coming in the kitchen saying “that smells really good!”

On my plate with 1 cup spiral pasta, and added crushed red pepper, basil and a sprinkle of Parmesan cheese.

And believe it or not, I will have one more post tonight for the BSI secret ingredient: oranges!     It’s not finished yet, so you’ll have to come back and see.  I’ll show you my ingredients though.  What do you think I made??

See you later tonight!