Ragu vs Spag Bol

I recently found out about the East London Steak Company from a favourite blog of mine – Eat like a Girl. I checked out the website and found that the meat was reasonably priced and I was intrigued by the different cuts you can get from there. They only sell beef, but they sell pretty much every beef cut you could want! I even got some of their delicious beef dripping for my Yorkshire Puds. Truly amazing stuff. So I placed an order, and the first thing I cooked was half a pound of diced chuck as a delicious, classic beef Ragu.

I think chuck steak is perfect for any type of slow cooking. East London Steak Co sell 2lb packages which is about 8 meals for two people, so all upcoming slow cooked beef has been made with this. And the beef from ELSC tastes absolutely delicious, much more flavourful compared to the beef from Waitrose, Abel and Cole and even the local butchers.

My ragu recipe is pretty much identical to my standard spaghetti bolognese recipe, the only difference is the type of meat used (chuck steak instead of mince), and the time spent cooking (long versus fairly quick). Technically bolognese is supposed to be a ragu, but when you’re rushing home at 7.30pm after a long, had day at work waiting 2+ hours for dinner would drive me bonkers. So I cut the cooking time with mince, I still keep the same flavours, but I use less tomato and cook on a much higher heat to speed up the reduction stirring more frequently to avoid burning.

The cooking time is what makes all the difference though, you could make a ragu with mince instead of chuck steak, it doesn’t end up with the same richness, but it’s still a ragu. The cooking time reduces the sauce to not only intensify the flavour but make the sauce drier as well. It caramelises the tomato sauce so it's sweeter and has more umami from the beef juices. With a ragu you end up with chucks of beef and veg coated in sauce, and what I love the best is the chunks of meat that have stuck to the bottom of the pan with the sauce almost burnt around it. The concentration of flavours (provided nothing actually burnt) is wonderful, it's sweet, salty, meaty and comforting.   With Spag Bol, I end up with a wetter sauce, which isn’t bad, but not the same.

Soffritto

The one thing that keeps both dishes delicious is the Soffritto. I used to really dislike celery for that aniseed flavour they have. But I’ve grown used to it now and I find that neither ragu nor spag bol are the same without it. I like to add extra’s to both dishes, notably anchovy/anchovy paste, honey, milk, vinegar and occasionally chilli sauce like sriracha. You can’t really taste the individual flavours of any of these ingredients once they had been cooked away, instead they provide added depth and background notes to the dish. Byron hates anchovies and has never noticed it in the dish before, so don’t be afraid to experiment! What else do you like adding to the dish?

Beef Ragu

Standard Spag Bol

On the pasta side, I used fresh pappardelle for the ragu, and dried spaghetti for the spag bol. I made this again more recently and used fussili which holds the sauce much better than penne (unless you get ridged penne). If you’re hand rolling home made pasta I would cut thin linguine type strips.

I don’t think it is good or OK to be snobbish about basic Spag Bol because it’s delicious even when it’s stripped back to simple ingredients. I'm referring to it as ‘Spag Bol’ because that’s the dish most families love and enjoy. I do think Spag Bol regulars should give a good ragu a go just once. One thing I’ve realised though, it’s hard to go back to basics once you've perfected your ragu recipe. :|

Ingredients

1lb diced Chuck steak

2 tins chopped Tomato

glass of red Wine

1 tbsp Balsamic Vinegar

1 tsp Anchovy paste

1 tbsp Chilli paste

1 tsp dried Basil

1 tsp dried Parsley

1 tsp dried Oregano

Milk

3 medium Carrots, diced

1 large Onion, diced

2 sticks Celery, diced

3 cloves Garlic, chopped finely

Salt & Pepper

Cooking oil

Your choice of Pasta

Recipe

Start by heating a large saucepan with a lid with a bit of oil. Brown the meat in batches if you need to, then set aside.

Add a bit more oil if necessary and start frying the onion, celery and carrots on a medium-low heat until the fragrant and the onions have turned translucent.

Return the meat and any juices back to pan and season well with salt and pepper. Add dried herbs, then wine. Let the wine boil for a few minutes to cook off the alcohol, then add tinned tomatoes. Fill a third of one tin with water and toss that into the pan as well. Give it a good stir and let it return to boil. Boil for about 5-10 minutes, then reduce to a simmer.

Add vinegar, anchovy & chilli paste, more salt if necessary, mix and taste. Add milk and then put the lid on to cook for 2 and half hours. Stir occasionally and check seasoning. After about 2 hours, check the wetness of the sauce, which should have reduced quite substantially. If it’s still too wet, cook without the lid on the last half an hour.

Serve over pasta with shavings of parmesan and freshly ground black pepper.