I think it looks like a fairly authentique bolognese. I made a similar recipe last winter, and mine did not curdle.It is a very think meat sauce, not a tomatoe sauce. I think the milk helps to break down the meat into very tender little morsels! I liked it but would not rush to make it again with the time committment.

janet

I thought authentic Bolognese sauce had milk in it.

I did too bumblebeez.

The rendered pancetta provides enough fat to cook and flavor the veggies, no worries there. I think the recipe sounds fine.

I think the trick is to make sure the milk is mostly boiled away before adding the wine. And the speciffcation of not lean beef and the pancetta would add the fat.

Frankly, it's the glutin-free pasta that doesn't sound that great to me.

I have been making Ragu Bolognese from Marcella Hazan's "The Classic Italian Cookbook" for about 30 years now.

Here is her description of the ragu:

"A properly made ragu clinging to the folds of homemade noodles is one of the most satisfying experiences accesible to the sense of taste. It is no doubt one of the great attractions of the enchanting city of Bologna, and the Bolognese claim one cannot make a true ragu anywhere else. This may be so, but with a little care, we can come very close to it. There are three essential points you must remember to make a successful ragu:

The meat must be sauteed just barely long enough to lose its raw color. It must not brown or it will lose delicacy.

It must be cooked in milk before the tomatoes are added. This keeps the meat creamier and sweeter tasting.

It must cook at the merest simmer for a long, long time. The minimum is 3 1/2 hours. 5 is better.

Her recipe starts with onion sauted in a combination of olive oil and butter, with celery and carrots - then some beef, a bit of salt and then dry white wine, which is cooked off and then the milk is added along with some nutmeg. Once that has evaporated, chopped tomatoes are added and it is simmered for the long time.

seagrass

Until recently I didn't even know there were variations of bolognese sauce that didn't contain milk or cream--every restaurant I've ordered it in in NYC served a creamed version. So the absence of milk would've surprised me, not the presence of it.

I Googled the posted recipe--it appears to be from Oprah's magazine. I doubt that Oprah is much of a cook herself, but she certainly can afford to hire the best!

Ok....apparently it doesn't sound bad to many of you....but I'm not making that! No garlic, too much celery, too much milk and wine added after the milk...LOL!
But had I not just made 2 dozen meatballs, I might have looked up a more authentic version than Oprah's...like Marcella Hazan's and made that....
But I guess I will do sort of an abbreviated version of Sunday Gravy.
Someone tell me....won't the milk curdle after cooking for 30 minutes when you dump in a cup of dry white wine???

Linda, this is not intended as personal criticism by any means, but I just wondered how you would feel if you offered to cook dinner for a friend, she quizzed you on what you planned to cook, and then went to look up your recipe on the internet with the result being that your friend said, "tell you what. I'll cook and you bring your gleutin free pasta?"

Personally, I would feel insulted. I realize that according to your sketch of the situation this recipe was something she had not made yet, and perhaps you and she have a sort of "tutor-student" relationship when it comes to cooking, goodness knows you are knowledgeable, experienced, and ever willing to help us here in the forum with our questions! :)

I only bring it up because I have occasionally put people off without intending to do so by wanting to help/offering advice/jumping in when what they wanted to do was to take their turn being the hostess, treating ME to a nice dinner!

I have to say...reading the original post, I thought the exact same thing as Rachelellen. I would have been hurt, too.

But maybe you and your friend have a relationship that it would not be a big deal. I would have just politely accepted her invitation, brought the salad and wine and enjoyed the company whether the food was great or not so much.

Linda

It wasn't really like that....we are cooking friends...but she is my daughter's age....and frankly her husband is a good friend of my son.
She was questioning the recipe....we were trying to put together the rest of the meal, what kind of a salad, wine.
We often talk about how to cook something....and she was raised by a mother who doesn't cook so has often sought advice from me. She loves good food but what her DH likes it best is well done steak, baked potato and a salad with a very sweet dressing...which he doesn't eat!
Oh my! I hope she wasn't insulted!! There was conversation about shall I cook and have you or shall you cook and have me...
Hadn't thought that she might be hurt by having me cook!!!....sigh.....

Well then, Linda, maybe it's all okay.

I am just thinking that maybe you could have offered to assist her in cooking the main meal rather than just letting her bring the pasta. That way she would get the benefit your expertise, learn something new, and someday become as good a cook as you are! (Okay, well almost as good...LOL)

Linda

The first time I had Ragu Bolognese was about 25 years ago at a little Italian restaurant in a small shopping center near me. I had never had anything like it and just loved it. It clearly had milk in it, it was very creamy and so tasty. I've never been able to recreate it, but I did find Marcella Hazan's bolognese sauce today, while I was looking for a good recipe for lasagna with bechamel sauce. Guess I'm going to have to give it a try.

Here is the Bolognese sauce I made at Christmas. It is amazingly good! The recipe was provided to me by a personal friend who is a chef and who has studied under Marcella Hazan.

2 TBS chopped yellow onion
salt
3 TBS olive oil
1 cup dry red wine (recipe uses white)
1 TBS butter
½ cup milk
2 TBS chopped celery
1/8 tsp nutmeg
2 TBS chopped carrot
2 c. crushed tomatoes w/basil & juice
¾ lb. ground lean beef

In the deepest, heavy pan available, heat the oil then add the chopped onion and sauté briefly over medium heat until just translucent. Add the celery and carrot and cook gently for 2 minutes.

Add ground beef, crumbling it in the pot with a fork. Add 2 tsp. salt plus pepper to taste, stir, and cook only until the meat has lost its raw, red color. Add the wine then turn the heat up to medium, and cook, stirring occasionally, until all the wine has evaporated.

Turn the heat down slightly, add the milk and the nutmeg and cook until the milk has evaporated. Stir frequently.

When the milk has evaporated, add the tomatoes and stir thoroughly. When the tomatoes started to bubble, turn the heat down until the sauce cooks at the laziest simmer, just an occasional bubble. Cook the sauce, uncovered, for a minimum of 3.5 to 4 hours, stirring occasionally. Taste and correct for salt.

I agree with the others -- that recipe looks very close to Marcella Hazan's recipe, which I make frequently and is absolutely luscious and delicious. It is very different from an italian-american sunday gravy, but that doesn't make it less wonderful. Linda, after hearing so many of us comment that we have made and enjoyed recipes similar to this, I guess I am mystified as to why you would remain so closed to the idea. It might be fun to try something new!

I don't know if it's Marcella Hazen's recipe or not, but it's close to what I've always made, which was the way my dad made it, and his parents came over on the boat. And for tender meatballs, I soak a couple slices of bread in milk before adding them to the meatball mix because Dad always did.

That's what I was thinking, Shermann, about all the recipes I've seen for meatballs or meatloaf that have milk in them. There must be a a chemical reason for it -- the milk must "do" something to the meat. Part of me is curious to try it (although, like Linda, I'm all "but...no garlic?") and part of me isn't sure I can get over my long-held aversion to milk with tomatoes.

Hey Linda!

I had asked a very similar question just a few days ago - I bet she saw the same Tyler Florence show I did (Dh watched it too) and the Bolognese he made ,looked absolutely astoundin.

Anyway, here is the link to the thread I started on the Tyler Florence Bolognese recipe)

Here is a link that might be useful: Tyler Florence Bolognese

I couldn't believe the lack of garlic either, but I confirmed it! The final sauce isn't creamy at all. It looks and tastes like the best tomato/meat sauce ever.

I should have mentioned - I did make the Bolognese sauce from Food & Wine and it was REALLY good!

Alexa
***************************************************

Bolognese Sauce from Food & Wine web site

Ingredients
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
4 garlic cloves, minced
3 ounces thinly sliced pancetta, finely chopped
1 medium carrot, finely diced
1 medium onion, finely diced
1 celery rib, finely diced
1 pound coarsely ground beef chuck
1 pound coarsely ground pork
1/4 pound mortadella, cut into 1/4-inch dice (optional)
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 cup dry white wine
One 28-ounce can Italian whole tomatoes, chopped, juices reserved
1 1/2 cups chicken or beef stock or low-sodium broth
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
3 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley
2 tablespoons chopped basil
Salt and freshly ground pepper
1 pound spaghetti
1/4 cup heavy cream
Freshly grated Parmesan cheese, for serving
Directions
1.In a medium enameled cast-iron casserole, melt the butter in the oil. Add the garlic, pancetta, carrot, onion and celery and cook over moderately low heat until the onion is golden, about 5 minutes. Add the ground beef and pork and cook over moderate heat, breaking up the meat with a wooden spoon, until no pink remains, about 8 minutes. Stir in the mortadella and tomato paste and cook for 2 minutes. Add the wine and cook, stirring, until reduced by half, about 3 minutes. Add the tomatoes with their juices, the stock, nutmeg and 1 tablespoon each of the parsley and basil and bring to a boil. Season with salt and pepper and simmer over low heat, stirring occasionally, until very thick, about 1 1/2 hours. Keep warm.
2.In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook the spaghetti until al dente. Drain and return it to the pot.
3.Stir the cream and the remaining 2 tablespoons of parsley and 1 tablespoon of basil into the meat sauce. Season the sauce with salt and pepper, then add 2 cups to the spaghetti and toss. Transfer the spaghetti to a large bowl, top with the remaining sauce and serve. Pass the Parmesan cheese at the table.

Make Ahead
The Bolognese sauce can be refrigerated for up to 5 days.

The milk absorbs more or less into the meat,so you don't know it is there. There is no chance of curdling. I use Marcella Hazan's recipe too and it is amazing.

My mom made it for me one time and "accidentally" left out the milk; it was not the same!

The food and Wine recipe is more like what I have made for a Bolognese sauce. Cream is added at the end to finish, the meat isn't cooked in the milk....and then wine added after the milk....and...it contains garlic.
Read again the original recipe...imagine what one oz of pancetta looks like, imagine if you will get anough fat from that to 'sautee until translucent" a carrot an onion and 2 stalks of celery....I don't think so.
So then you add a pound of meat....say ground chuck and cook and break up and add a cup of milk and cook until that cup of milk has boiled away, add a cup of white wine and cook that away....so you are left with mostly the mead and what's left of the veggies and you add a 15 oz can of tomatoes....that's not even 2 cups....and you cook that, uncovered at a very very low simmer for 3 hours?

I'll make the recipe from food and wine or the one Beachlily posted from Marcella Hazan. It's not the milk in the sauce that turns me off....but the amount of milk for the rest of the ingredients and the absence of seasonings like garlic and basil and the fact that you add the wine AFTER the milk.
And yes...the meatballs I made last night did contain some bread soaked in milk....
And....curses! I wonder if she will even be able to eat the sauce if I cook those meatballs in it?? Never thought about that........

Linda, the final sauce is so thick I spread it on the lasagne as if it was a cheese spread. Read: very thick. How in the world would meatballs go with this? And consider, I love meatballs! Trust me that you never miss garlic or basil, although a different Italian chef (from Naples) told me to stir in some frizzled pancetta and shredded basil at the end of the cooking. I didn't do that and was amazed at the richness and tenderness of this sauce. Apparently, I amazed myself that I could do this!

I was told that the key to good Bolognese is unbrowned
ground meat. If the meat is not browned, the milk will keep it very tender.

Note to self for New Year: continue promoting friendship with Italian chefs--it improves my cooking.

Not all Italian food contains garlic. Or basil, either.

Nor is all of it always overpowered by tomatoes or tomato sauce, or whatever form of tomatoes one chooses to use.

That seems to be a very American (mis)conception.

Rusty

Agreed with Rusty -- the Marcella Hazan sauce does not have garlic or basil in it, and is wonderful -- the absence of those flavors allows the flavors of the meat and the carrot-onion-celery to shine through. And also agree with Beachlily, this style of sauce is very thick when done -- I have seen it more referred to as meat with sauce than sauce with meat. Such that that amount of liquid is appropriate -- it really doesn't have much "sauce" at the end, but instead is divinely flavored loosely held together meat. Again Linda, I think the key is changing your expectations away from it being any form of traditional italian-american sauce -- though I'm glad to hear that you're going to give a version of this a try!

Just curious, do you think that these recipes would work with a soy milk as a substitute for us lactose intolerant types?

Now I have to make this, you know.

Rusty, you're right, and I know it. I just love garlic and am married to a man who, for many years, read "one clove of garlic' as "one head of garlic" when he cooked. :)D

You guys are starting to talk me into it. No reason why it won't freeze.

Read again the difference between the Marcella Hazan recipe and the one I posted....MH has 2 T each of celery carrot and onion. the one I posted has 2 stalks of celery a large carrot and 2 stalks of celery....I am guessing a total of about 1 1/2 cups of chopped veggies....while the MH has only 3/4 of a cup
MH's recipe contains both oil and butter....mine contains only the fat in one oz of pancetta.
The recipe I posted calls for 1 cup of milk, MH's only for 1/2 cup, but admittedly it only has 3/4 pound of meat......but the recipe I posted says to brown the meat.
I am not quarreling with the concept of a Bolognese sauce....but only with THAT recipe.
But my own version of Sunday gravy without the rouladen is simmering away and I better shape the bread and enmpty the dishwasher.
Linda c

Now I've got to try this too!

And yes, the milk is there to make the meat tender. But I agree that it sounds like too much celery..

Compumom, there seems to be some disagreement over just how milk tenderizes meat. I have read that it is due to certain enzymes and also that it is due to the calcium. You can get soy milk that is fortified with calcium, but I have no idea what enzymes it has in common with regular milk.

Some lactose intolerant people can eat yogurt, and in India, yogurt is often used as a marinade to tenderize meat. I suspect that if you are one of those who can tolerate yogurt, you could sub it for the milk. It has a bit more tang, but in a sauce you could counter that by upping the amount of sweet veggies, like carrots. Or, if you make your own yogurt, you can control (to a certain extent) how tangy it is.

Well... In their discussion titled "Science: Why Does Milk Make Meat Tender?" Cook's Illustratrated quite surprisingly makes no mention of enzymes or any chemical properties of milk. While talking about cooking the meat in milk they say, parenthetically, "or any other liquid," and thereby seem to imply the issue is more a matter of limiting cooking temp to 212 F so that the meat doesn't get tough. That leads me to infer that milk offers flavors but no magic.

Renee - A lot of soup or sauce recipes containing milk or cream call for adding it only after defrost/reheat if frozen. I've never experimented otherwise, just have taken their word for it, but it's enough to make me not simply assume any bolognese can be frozen.