WELCOME TO THE FIRST “Cooking with Q”: Pasta Bolognese. I’m posting late, as this was made on May 16, 2009; plus, somehow I did not end up with a photo of our completed dish. Instead, I photographed the facing page of the recipe, which was taken from the book Italy: A Culinary Journey, published by Collins Publishers San Francisco in 1991 (recipe p. 115).
I’ve had this book since it first came out, back when I was in college. It was a gift from my dad, and it’s been my primary source for Italian recipes ever since. The book is gorgeous, as much a travel book as a cookbook—all the more reason why I’m thrilled that the recipes are good. I’ve yet to make anything from the book that I didn’t like, and I’ve done many of the recipes, both savory and sweet.
The pasta bolognese is one I’d done before, which may be why my son chose this dish for our first cooking date. Although, truthfully, the only reason I started making it is that my parents tested out some store-bought version on my son first. He loved it.
Now, pasta sauce is one of many things I generally insist on making from scratch; it’s really too difficult to discern what’s in it otherwise, despite ingredients labels. I’m glad my parents purchased this one, though, because without their initiative, I’m not sure that my son would be eating—and now making—bolognese. I tend to forget it exists. It’s just not part of the family repertoire, or it didn’t used to be. Growing up, I cannot remember a single instance of this dish on our family table. But now it’s something my son looks forward to each time he heads to Connecticut to see his grandparents. So, with no prompting whatsoever, when I asked my son what he’d like to make with me for our first project, his answer was immediate: “pasta bolognese.” And also very particular: “…with those twisty shapes in three colors” (also known as rotini tricolore).
The only alteration from the recipe as it appears in my book was a swapping out of about half the called-for ground pork, using ground veal as an additional selection (along with the amount of beef indicated in the recipe). At the grocery store’s butcher counter, my son insisted on holding the paper-wrapped packages of meat, which he did with such care I could tell he was looking forward to our cooking adventure. I just worried that the recipe preparation would be too long for him, and that it could turn him off to future cooking. Bolognese is not difficult to make, but it does require a good amount of prep.
Turned out, it was fine; great in fact. Even when asked if he wanted to take the occasional break, my son preferred to stick to the task at hand. I was particularly impressed with his diligence and care in creating a small dice for the one whole carrot and the celery branch that would get sauteed with onion and bacon to start the sauce off. Standing on a two-tiered kitchen stepladder, set up with a cutting board and a small paring knife, he applied himself wholeheartedly to the vegetable chopping. It took him a long time, but he achieved a dice smaller and more regular than any I would have produced. (This gave me pause: my six-year-old had more patience than I? Impossible!) We worked side by side, and since we’d decided to listen to some music, we were humming along with Alan Jackson, which was also my son’s choice. Maybe we should have been making cornbread and chicken instead of bolognese?
My son helped with everything. He chopped, getting a lesson in knife safety with round vegetables (cut in half lengthwise first, creating a flat side to put down on the board). He measured out butter, olive oil, beef broth, tomato paste, and milk (great for practicing math skills). And he stirred. Boy, did he stir. He got rather possessive about the stirring, actually, and did not want me to do it at all, despite the fact that this meant approximately twenty minutes of nearly nonstop stirring over the stove. The only time he’d step away was to run to other rooms down the hall to determine whether the smell of butter and vegetables, of meat and dry white wine, carried throughout the apartment. It did. Hovering over the stock pot, we oohed and ahhed over the aroma.
By the time the sauce was ready to be left alone, cooking for an hour, more or less undisturbed, it’s true he was ready to stop. He ended up playing “Battleship” with my husband. All I did without him, though, was to give a stir every so often and add more broth when the sauce started to get too dry.
About an hour and forty minutes after setting to work, our first co-produced meal was ready to dish out. We set the table nicely for three, and enjoyed the results of our labor. I have to say, it was the best bolognese I’ve ever had. Better than the other times I’ve made the same recipe, and I’m sure it was due to the meticulous chopping and eager stirring of the junior chef at my side. I do wish I’d taken a picture or two—of the sauce, sure, but also of the evident pride on my son’s face as he passed the grated parmesan to my husband, knowing that his was the effort that fed us that day. Without hesitation, we all had seconds.
