the pasta bolognese recipe you must follow

Next time you're craving some easy peasy comforting pasta bolognese {spaghetti with meat sauce} please please please take a cue or two from this recipe. 

The result is rich, deep flavor that sticks to every noodle. 

Stomach growling...

#NoFilter

Pasta Bolognese

Recipe courtesy of Anne Burrell, Secrets of a Restaurant Chef

You know what they say about seasoning every step of the way? This recipe introduced me to the idea of browning every step of the way. I will now live and die by this cooking rule. 

Now, no one, NO ONE, has 5 hours and 15 minutes to make spaghetti with meat sauce. If you're like me, when you want this dish it's when you're tired, you're time strapped and there's nothing tasty in the kitchen. Your belly wants to be full, it wants to be warm, and it wants to be full and warm RIGHT NOW. 

That was exactly my situation the night of the amazing pasta bolognese {it gets the fancy name this time}. However, my brand new gorgeous Le Creuset was staring at me begging to be used. I felt it would be just downright disrespectful to carelessly throw pre-made pasta sauce into it and call it a day. So I called on an old memory of this Food Network episode and did the best I could. 

I poured myself a glass of wine and prepared to prolong the cooking process of what would become better-than-everyday-pasta pasta.

The onion and garlic sizzled and sizzled and browned and browned for as long as they could take it. 

The tomatoes did the same thing as did the meat. 

Each element was well seasoned, had ample space in the pan {I made space by removing elements where necessary} and soaked up the heat until they were beautifully browned and their flavors were bursting at the seams. 

Last I added in the pre-made pasta sauce and made sure to really hit it with heat to release the flavors. 

The pan was deglazed {as they say} with a touch of wine, from my drinking glass no less, to release all of the super brown bits from the bottom and the pan was left alone to bubble together.

 I stole a note from Giada DeLaurentis and tossed in two frozen parmesan rinds to add some salty and creamy flavors to my sauce. 

All in all the whole sauce took a good hour or more to create and about 30 minutes to reduce and combine. Maybe I should have let that process take longer, maybe I was going crazy starving though! 

This pasta tasted of love. The sauce clung to the noodles and was the most perfect consistency. I've never taken so long with a simple pasta sauce before and I always WILL from here on out. So worth it. And don't even get me going on how scrumptious the mounds of leftovers were. 

Take your time

:) amch