Monday Madness - Spaghetti Bolognese with Meatballs

Spaghetti Bolognese with meatballs - the way we like it.

I decided that this should be the logical start for the blog, as this was the first food that I learnt to prepare in my mom's kitchen. My variation of Spaghetti Bolognese is now a Monday night dinner demand in our household and will result in a riot if not presented promptly.

My virgin cooking experience did not start with baking a cake like the usual pastime for mothers and daughters in the 1980’s in South Africa. I would also not claim that my mother did not like cooking, but it was rather done out of necessity and sometimes lacked passion. She would much rather have spent time behind her sewing machine or in her garden. What also made it worse, to be honest, is that as a kid I was also quite lazy in the kitchen department. So maybe it frustrated my mother that she had this kid that did not want to help or learn to cook or bake.

Growing up during the 1980's in South Africa meant that limited choices on the supermarket shelves existed and included not a heck more than All Gold Tomato Sauce and Mrs. Ball’s Chutney. But at some stage my mother bought an exotic looking packet that promised turning ordinary mince meat into authentic Italian Spaghetti Bolognese. I thought that this was revolutionary, still obviously very impressionable at that stage. Little did I know that there is not such a dish as Spaghetti Bolognese - at least not according to horrified Italians. The picture on the box intrigued me and created a longing for faraway places and people. That sure as hell got me into the kitchen and cooking away. The box included a few sachets of herbs and flavourings and some dried spaghetti, and with Latin passion I added the contents to my fried mince meat and onions to create my first dish of Spaghetti Bolognese. Probably the only thing Italian about it was the corny picture on the box, but that I only realised many years later! The horror of all horrors, I must confess, was that I also added All Gold tomato sauce, Worcestershire sauce and even Mrs. Ball’s chutney to my sauce! What can I say – old habits die hard when those are the only choices for flavourings.

Many sources reckon that Spaghetti Bolognese was probably invented outside of Italy by Italian emigrants. According to purists there are two problems with Spaghetti Bolognese. Firstly, the Bolognese sauce does not contain the correct ingredients and secondly, it was never meant to be served with spaghetti. Yes, I know this is confusing, because this is the way all of us non-Italians love this comfort-food! The reason why the Bolognese sauce should not be served with spaghetti but rather tagliatelle or papperdelle is that the sauce will just slide off of the thin spaghetti and will adhere to the much wider tagliatelle or ultra-wide papperdelle. That sounds logical enough. Many Italians are just insulted by the idea of serving the Bolognese sauce with spaghetti.

The sauce that we call Bolognese sauce is actually called Ragù alla Bolognese by Italians. The recipe originates from the documented version of Pellegrino Artusi in the late18^th century Imola, near Bologna. Ingredients included minced meat, pancetta (bacon), onion, carrot, celery, tomato concentrate, red wine, nutmeg, salt and pepper, but no other herbs. Artusi noted that the taste can be made even more pleasant by adding small pieces of dried mushroom, truffle or a chicken liver cooked with the meat. He added half a glass of cream as a final touch. According to Antonio Carluccio the traditional Bolognese sauce contains no garlic, nor a single herb, only meat, onions, a little tomato paste and vegetables. There are a zillion different versions of the “authentic” sauce and this reminds me of the passionate Italians that could not even during times of war stand together. But that is another topic for an all together other time. I looked at a few sources for my inspiration and then created my own version of the truth, seeing that there is not one ultimate accepted dogma of Bolognese sauce. My sources were "Bringing Tuscany Home" by Frances Mayes, "World Kitchen Italy" by Murdoch Books, "Light of Lucia" by Luciana Sampogna and some other random readings on the Internet.

Up to now, the only recollection I had of Bologna was a city in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy where I almost had the disaster of missing my only train back to Munich where the plane back to South Africa was waiting. Cubano managed to pull me into the train as the doors were closing and thus the first rule of travelling was created: “If you are unable to run with your luggage, then you are not travelling light enough!” Because of following this rule I managed to run fast enough to catch the leaving train.

Anyway, before I divert totally. I consulted many resources to come up with my ideas for my own Spaghetti Bolognese. Yes, I know it is not served with spaghetti and I will also break another rule and serve it with meatballs. Just because my children love it and it is way more fun than just the boring old sauce. But I will try to remain true to the ingredients and methods that inspired me, mainly due to the fact that I respect their efforts. I will steer clear of adding curry, chutney and Worcestershire sauce (at least while preparing the meatballs and sauce, but I have no control over what the diners add after it has been served). Monday nights are now more special because we fell into the comfort of our passionate routine of making Spaghetti Bolognese with meatballs, pouring a nice glass of wine and listening to corny Italian music on the stereo. Hopefully these are the homely scenes that my family will remember. I don’t believe that everything is an exact science, but rather that one enjoys the personal interpretation and memories created in the process. Like they say: "If it makes you happy, it can't be that bad!"

Spaghetti Bolognese with Meatballs

Author: Dulcie & Cubano
Serves 4 - 6

Ingredients:
For the tomato sauce
1 tbsp olive oil
125g smoked bacon
2 chicken livers
1 onion
1 carrot
1 celery stick
1 can (400g)  tinned tomatoes
1/2 sachet (25g) tomato concentrate
250 ml dry white wine
Pinch of nutmeg
1 tsp basil and oreganum dried herbs
Ground black pepper to taste
Pinch of salt
For the meatballs
4 tbsp olive oil for frying
1kg beef mince
1 egg
75g breadcrumbs and 125g breadcrumbs for rolling
1/2 sachet (25g) tomato concentrate
2.5 ml salt
Pasta
1 tbsp salt
2 tbsp olive oil
250g spaghetti (or tagliatelle if you insist)

Method:
For the tomato sauce
Finely chop onion, carrot and celery stick. Fry the vegetable mix in oil until the onions are translucent and then add finely chopped bacon and chicken livers. Fry until bacon and chicken livers are cooked through. Add can of chopped tomatoes and the tomato concentrate. Add salt, pepper, nutmeg and herbs. Add the wine and cook through for a few minutes. Puree the sauce.
For the meatballs
Mix mince, egg, tomato paste and 75g of breadcrumbs. Add salt and pepper. Roll into walnut sized balls. Before frying into olive oil, roll each mince ball in breadcrumbs. Fry until lightly brown but not cooked through. Put fried meatballs into a baking dish and pour tomato sauce over it. Bake at 200 degrees for 30 minutes.
Pasta
Add pasta to a big pot of boiling water. Add 1 tbl salt and 2 tbl olive oil. Cook until al dente.

Serve the meatballs in tomato sauce on a bed of pasta and add a generous helping of grated parmesan cheese.