Spaghetti Bolognese
500g lean beef mince
Brown onion (1 finely chopped)
Garlic clove (1 minced) at least 3 cloves, no need to mince, just finely chop
Tomato paste (1 teaspoon) not tomato-y enough, 1 Tablespoon
Anchovy paste (2 Tablespoons) too fishy, 1 Tablespoon
Worcestershire sauce (2 Tablespoons)
Beef stock (1 cup)
Carrot (1 large, grated)
Zucchini (1 grated)
Mushrooms (150g, chopped small)
Tomato passata (1 Cup) 1 small bottle
Italian herbs
Salt & pepper
Sautee onion in olive oil until soft.
Add garlic, tomato paste, and anchovy paste & cook for 30 sec.
Add mince, sprinkle with Worcestershire sauce, & keep stirring until mostly cooked and no clumps remain.
Add beef stock, carrot, zucchini, & mushrooms.
Add enough passata to just cover, sprinkle with herbs, season with salt & pepper.
Cover and cook on low heat, stirring occasionally until ready to use (15 min).
Start by gathering all the ingredients you will need and placing them on the kitchen bench. The white countertop is a stark contrast to the dark granite of your childhood kitchen. It still feels too wide without a bread-maker or thermomixer along the backsplash.
From the pantry cupboard: a box of dried pasta (you would normally use whatever was on sale, but you are cooking for your mother and so you will buy the Barilla Rigatoni; it is her favourite), 1 brown onion, 2 cloves of garlic, the bottle of Worcestershire, a carton of beef stock, a packet of Italian herbs, and the salt and pepper.
From the fridge: 500g of lean beef mince, tomato paste, anchovy paste, 1 large carrot, 1 zucchini, 150g of mushrooms, and tomato passata.
Pull out the large saucepan from the cupboard. The white non-stick one with the matching lid that your mother gave you when you moved into your first sharehouse. Put it on the stove and turn the heat on medium. Leave it there to preheat. Remember what she told you about always using a hot pan to make sure that the food cooks evenly.
Get the large chopping board from the drawer under the microwave. You will also need a knife; the large one that she gave you for Christmas two years ago. It matches the one from her set that she bought herself as an investment piece. Consider that you should probably sharpen it; she did always say that sharp knifes are safer than dull ones.
Finely chop the onion the way that she taught you. Slice in half lengthways. Top and tail the halves. Slice thinly one way, then turn the knife perpendicular. Slice the other way to finish with small pieces.
Add olive oil to the saucepan that has been preheating. Hover your hand over it. Once you can feel the heat radiating from the oil in the pan, add in the onion. The onion should sizzle as it hits the hot metal. Stir gently, making sure that each piece of onion is coated in olive oil. You will know the onion is soft enough when the pieces become shiny and translucent.
Press the flat side of the knife on the garlic cloves and, using the heel of your hand and your bodyweight, lean on the knife to crush the cloves. The peel will now easily come off. Roughly chop the garlic. Add the garlic to the pan with the tomato paste and the anchovy paste. It will initially smell very strongly of fish, but don’t worry, the smell will mellow as the anchovy paste cooks down. Stir until all the ingredients in the pan come to a thick, chunky paste and the kitchen smells like the warmth and safety of your mother’s house. You stress about the time, then remember her saying somewhere between 30 seconds and a minute. Cooking isn’t like baking, your mother always said. It’s more of an art than a science. You need to feel it.
Once your thick paste of aromatic goodness has come together, add the beef mince. The sizzle from the meat coming into contact with the pan should impress you. Don’t worry if there is some splattering from the pan; that is the moisture from the beef meeting the melting fat and oils already in the pan. Break up the mince into small clumps. You are aiming for some serious browning. Sprinkle in the Worcestershire sauce. She always said to ‘vibe it,’ but to calm your cooking stresses, gave you an estimation of two tablespoons. She knows you will measure out the two tablespoons of sauce and pour them in. Maybe one day you will learn to cook by sight and not by careful measurement. Stir until the beef is mostly cooked and there are no large clumps remaining.
Pour in the cup of beef stock. Until recently you would have always used a stock cube, but she always insisted that it tastes better if you use the real deal and made it yourself. The carton of premade stock was the compromise of good taste without the time commitment of stewing beef bones for eight hours yourself.
Get out the box grater. She would use a food processor to save time, but you and the people you live with wouldn’t use it enough to justify the cost of it. So, you grate the carrot and the zucchini by hand. Roughly chop the mushrooms. The preparation of the vegetables will always take longer than you think it will; briefly panic that the extra time will make the food in the pan burn. Remember that she said it’s okay to leave the mixture in the pan to simmer. This particular cooking process is not a race against time. It is okay to give it time to rest. Once the vegetables are prepared, add them to the sauce and mix them through.
Add passata until the mixture is just covered. Rinse out the passata jar with hot water and pour that into the pan as well. Sprinkle over the Italian herbs; this is the one place in the recipe that you do feel comfortable ‘vibing it.’ Crack some black pepper over the sauce and sprinkle over a couple of healthy pinches of salt. Stir through and put the lid on the pan. Turn the heat down to low and leave it; the flavours need time to get to know each other.
Take a deep breath. Listen to the way the birds sing outside. Note how they sound different in this part of the country, a more melodic chirping than the loud squawks of seagulls. Look out the kitchen window at the unfamiliar but beautiful skyline. Remind yourself that you are alive and that life is beautiful, that getting up each day is worth it.
Fill the large pot with water and salt it well. Put that on the stove and turn the heat up to high. Cover with the lid so that it will boil quicker.
Fill the sink with hot water to begin cleaning up while waiting for the water to boil. Wash up the chopping board, the knife, the grater, and the measuring spoons. In between all that, start putting away the leftover ingredients. Wipe down the benchtop. Checking the time, realise that she will be here soon. Add the pasta to the now boiling water and set the timer for a minute less than the box says.
Pull out two bowls from the cupboard, two forks from the draw, and the grated cheese from the freezer. Hear the doorbell ring. Trip through the dining room to answer it. Feel your heartrate quicken a little. Open the door and —
Hello! It’s good to see you!
Lead her through to the kitchen where dinner is almost ready.
Is that my bolognese?
Tell her it is.
It smells just like when I used to make it.
