In my mad rush to have a freezer full of frozen meals before the birth of my first baby, I started with a bolognese sauce. I figured this sauce could be heated and served with spaghetti, could be turned into lasagne or could even be used to make a shepherd’s pie. A good bolognese sauce recipe is a must have for every family and is a great way to hide vegetables in a meal, especially for those with children reluctant to eat their greens.
Here is my recipe:
Ingredients
- 1 onion, diced
- 1 teaspoon minced garlic
- 1 tbs olive oil
- 2 carrots, diced
- 2 stalks celery, diced
- 500grams lean beef mince
- 1/2 tbs plain flour
- 150ml white wine
- 3 tins crushed tomatoes
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- 2 tablespoons worcestershire sauce
- 1 tsp dried basil
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- salt and pepper
Method
Heat oil over low-medium heat and gently saute onion and garlic for 5 minutes. Add carrots and celery and continue to saute for another 5 minutes or until onions are translucent.
Increase heat to medium-high and add beef mince. Stir, breaking up mince with spoon, until browned. Sprinkle over flour and stir to combine. Add white wine and cook until liquid has reduced by half.
Add crushed tomatoes, tomato paste, worcestershire sauce, basil and oregno. Stir to combine and bring sauce to the boil. Once boiling, reduce heat to low and simmer, oncovered for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.
If sauce becomes too thick during the 1 hour simmer, add water (100ml at a time) to loosen the sauce.
Serve with your favourite pasta shape.
Serves 6.
I find that this recipe makes enough sauce that I can make spaghetti bolognese for my husband and I – and – still have enough left over that I can freeze the sauce in 2 containers. Therefore I can make one batch of sauce and have enough to make 3 meals of spaghetti bolognese for hubby and I (not that we actually eat spaghetti 3 nights in a row…).
In my late pregnancy craze, I doubled this recipe and was able to make enough sauce that I froze 3 batches (you guessed it, to be served with pasta) and made 2 lasagnes. 1 lasagne was frozen (enough for 2 meals for the 2 of us) and the other was eaten over two nights. That’s one very large pot of bolognese sauce that was made into enough meals for 7 dinners. I’m doing well.
{ 1 trackback }