How to make Bolognese ragù: the original recipe

Meat ragù is a traditional Bolognese sauce, delicious and perfect for seasoning many dishes. Here is the registered recipe!

Do you know how to make a good meat sauce? No, we are not talking about those sauces prepared on the fly in about twenty minutes , much less the ready-made ones that we can easily find at the counter of our trusted supermarket ; we are talking about the real Bolognese sauce prepared to perfection and according to tradition !

Before starting, however, you should know that this recipe… requires a lot of calm. This is a sauce that must be made with love , patience, attention to detail, and therefore it is certainly not suitable for an improvised last-minute dinner. Our advice? Take a morning or an afternoon, perhaps on Sunday , to prepare it calmly and rediscover small gestures, aromas, and enjoy a good dish together to your family! Think about it, in the meantime we'll show you how to make ragù: the classic and infallible recipe for preparing this fantastic sauce!

• Recipe
• Process with the Thermomix
• Variants
• Conservation
• Origin and history

How to make meat ragù: traditional Bolognese recipe

Did you know that there is an official recipe registered with the Bologna Chamber of Commerce for this meat sauce? As you know, we love trying recipes as they are originally, so here are all the steps from the original registered Bolognese meat sauce recipe .

1. Start by chopping or grinding the pork belly . Brown it in a 24-26 cm diameter pan together with the oil .
2. In the meantime, finely chop the celery, carrot and onion and add them to the pan once the bacon has melted. Let it simmer for 5 minutes.
3. Add the minced meat and brown it too for 10 minutes before adding the wine , white or red.
4. As soon as you no longer smell alcohol, add the tomato puree and concentrate and start cooking.
5. The Bolognese sauce must cook covered for at least 2 hours . Cook it by adding broth (including stock cubes) little by little to prevent it from drying out excessively. Halfway through the time, add the milk , keeping in mind that it is optional.
6. Finally, season with salt and pepper .

The meat sauce then gave life to two of the recipes that made Italian cuisine famous throughout the world. We are talking about baked pasta and homemade tagliatelle, two cornerstones of family Sundays.

Here is a video that illustrates all the steps and the magnificent final consistency that this condiment must have.

How to make meat sauce with the Thermomix

If you have the legendary Thermomix, however, you can combine tradition and modernity! Here's how to proceed:

1. In the bowl, chop the celery, carrot and onion for 10 seconds at speed 5. Add the oil and fry for 5 minutes , Varoma temperature, speed 1.
2. Assemble the farfalle and add the two minced meats: cook for 2 minutes, maintaining the Varoma temperature and speed 1.
3. Without changing the temperature and speed, add the wine and after 3 minutes also the puree and the concentrate.
4. Cook for about 15 minutes at 100°C , on Soft speed. Then set the Varoma temperature and let it go for another 30 minutes, adding half the milk.
5. Add the salt and herbs and your meat sauce is ready!

Variants: what the original registered recipe says

The Academy of Italian Cuisine allows some variations in the preparation of ragù, while maintaining rigorous respect for tradition. The meat used can be a combination of beef, which should make up around 60%, and pork, which makes up the remaining 40%, preferably taken from the loin or neck. The use of knife-minced meat is acceptable to obtain a more rustic consistency, while fresh bacon can be replaced with stretched or rolled bacon.

The addition of a light amount of nutmeg is allowed, as are additional ingredients such as chicken livers, hearts and gizzards. Pork sausage , skinned and chopped, can also be included, along with blanched peas to add at the end of cooking, or dehydrated porcini mushrooms soaked in water.

On the other hand, there are some variations that cannot be accepted . The use of only pork or veal is not permitted, nor is the use of smoked bacon. The only spice allowed is a light note of nutmeg, while other flavorings or spices are prohibited. Brandy cannot be used as a substitute for wine and the use of flour to thicken the ragù is not permitted.

Conservation

The Bolognese ragù can be kept for about 2-3 days in the refrigerator, inside a container with an airtight lid. If you used fresh ingredients you can also freeze it in the freezer.

Origin and history

It seems absurd and yet this dish that has made the history of Italian cuisine in the world was born… in France ! It is the result of the reworking of a typical French medieval dish, the ragout . This term used to indicate everything that was cooked over a slow heat, therefore meat or vegetable stews. Starting from the 12th century it was prepared indiscriminately by farmers and lords using what was available.

He arrived in Italy many years later, to be precise in Naples , together with the Angevin court. At the time, however, ragout was still a main dish, as evidenced by a work in four canvases by Botticelli , the Nastagio degli Onesti . Only the passage of time transforms it into a condiment, gradually becoming the recipe we know today.

In 1773 Vincenzo Corrado in "Il cuoco galante" reported the Neapolitan variant for the first time, better described a few years later (1790) in "L'apicio moderni" by Francesco Leonardi. Here we find Neapolitan maccheroncini seasoned with pepper, parmesan, sliced ​​veal then left to rest on the ash before serving. Only in a posthumous version was tomato added to the meat.

We arrive at 1800. The ragù arrives in Bologna and in 1891 it appears in the famous cookery treatise by Pellegrino Artusi . It's still not the recipe we know today due to the absence of tomato, and the pasta format remains macaroni, but we're almost there.

During the First World War the format of pasta changed and they became tagliatelle , cheaper and easier to find, and the tomato appeared for the first time. It also arrives in the United States together with Italian emigrants where it marries spaghetti .

The fame of Bolognese ragù continues to grow (think that it is also mentioned in Puccini's Bohème) and this leads the Academicians of Bologna to deposit the only and original recipe for meat sauce to accompany tagliatelle with the Chamber of Commerce. It's October 17, 1982 .

After over 40 years, on 20 April 2023 a study committee revised it based on new dietary needs as well as the most modern containers and cooking techniques. The notarial deed is kept at the Palazzo della Mercanzia together with 34 other traditional recipes deposited.

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What is the new recipe for the official Bolognese ragù?