Tagliatelle Alla Bolognese - The Real Thing!

It is that time again...time for the Secret Recipe Club reveal!  I was really excited to see that I was assigned to Manuela's site, Manu's Menu!  Manuela was born and raised in Milan, Italy by Sicilian parents but currently resides in Australia with her husband and two daughters.  Manuela loves food and is eager to share the concepts of authentic Italian dishes with others.  Her site is the "real thing"!

I had so many choices of things to make that it was very difficult.  In the end I decided that since I had never made a bolognese sauce I would find a recipe for that.  What could be more authentic than Manuela's grandmother's recipe for Tagliatelle Alla Bolognese?  I could hardly wait to make my way into the kitchen.  

Rather than try to convert the metrics, I used a scale and measuring cups showing the metric measure.  

The only chance I took was with the "1/3 glass of red wine".  I decided that she couldn't mean a wine glass as that would be too small of an amount and it couldn't mean 1/3 cup or it would have been written in ml.  So, I took out a water glass decided that 1/3 of the glass would probably measure 1/2 cup.  "smile" (It was a large glass!)   I figured too much wine couldn't possibly be a problem!

I also withheld some of the water.  It appeared that for the amount of meat and vegetables in the pot, that 800 ml might be too much.  I started with 500 ml and decided to see what it looked like at the end of the hour.  Manuela describes the appearance of the mixture and I knew that would work for me.  I was happy that I only used 500 ml of water.  The sauce cooked down nicely and didn't need any extra.

Tagliatelle Alla Bolognese

Yield:  4 servings

350 gms beef mince (3/4 pound)

1 rib celery, finely chopped

1 carrot, finely chopped

1 onion, finely chopped

2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil

1/3 glass red wine (I used 1/2 cup Merlot as that was open!)

300 gms canned tomatoes

Salt 

Pepper

800 ml water

350 gms egg tagliatelle 

Finely dice the onion, carrot, and celery and put them in a pot with the extra virgin olive oil.  Saute on slow fire until soft (but do not brown).

Add the mince and stir well with a wooden spoon making sure you  remove all the lumps.  Brown the meat well.  Add the red wine and raise the fire to burn off the alcohol.

Add the slat,  pepper, tomatoes and  water.

Cover and cook on a low fire for about an hour.  Add water (or reduce it on the fire) if needed.  The sauce doesn't have to bee too thick, you have to be able to see 1/2 a glass of watery sauce  at the bottom of the pan when you stir it.

Cook the tagliatelle following the steps on How to cook  pasta "al dente" on the Techniques page of Manu's Menu.  Drain it and serve with the Bolognese sauce and thinly grated Parmigiano Reggiano on the top.

PRINTABLE RECIPE

Mr. T and I really enjoyed the meal!  Simple ingredients, simple preparation and wonderful  flavor!  Do stop by Manu's Menu for some great, authentic Italian dishes.  You won't be disappointed.  

In case you are not familiar with the Secret Recipe Club, I will give you some background.  Each month club members are assigned a secret blog from which we select recipe to prepare and write about in a blog post.  We keep our assignment secret until  reveal day when  we when everybody's posts appear at the same time.  That just takes a little behind the scene coordination by the leader Amanda at Amanda's Cookin' and Angela at Big Bear's Wife who helps with Group C.  Thank you to both of you.