At La Fortezza I always have a pot of
this sauce going on the stove. Our guests expect it to be served when they visit. Not only is it great on all variations of
pasta, but I use any leftovers on our wood-fired pizza too. This is our most popular pizza topping.
Grass-fed beef is much better than choice or prime when it comes to flavor. Make sure you form it into a 1-inch-thick
patty and brown it on both sides before you break it up with a heatproof spatula. Don’t break it up before you
brown it — the meat will stay moist as it cooks.
In this video, we combine it with fresh tagliatelle, the recipe and method for which follows below.
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LA FORTEZZA BOLOGNESE SAUCE
Ingredients:
- ½ cup extra virgin olive oil
- 1lb ground beef (at least 15 % fat)
- 1 carrot, chopped
- 4 ribs of celery chopped
- 1 yellow onion, chopped
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1x 14 oz can Mutti polpo tomatoes
Preparation:
Place the olive oil in a Dutch oven. Add the ground beef to one side of the pan, it should be in one piece. Chef’s Tip: This allows the ground beef brown evenly and it is less likely to dry out.
Add the carrot, celery, onion, and sprinkle the salt over the top. On medium heat sauté the meat until it is deep brown and then flip it, making sure to keep it whole, let it brown on the other side. Meanwhile, stir your veggies to ensure that they don’t burn they will be cooking on the other half of the pot, sauté them until caramelized. They will be a nice brown color.
When the veggies are cooked, stir in the garlic, and then begin to break up the ground beef with a heat proof spatula mixing it into the veggies. Once the ground beef is completely broken up, add the tomatoes with their juice. Break up the tomatoes with your spoon and let them gently cook down until they’re reduced by half. At this point, you’re Bolognese should be finished cooking and it’s ready to use on pasta or pizza.
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TAGLIATELLE
This is our basic pasta dough recipe; I use it consistently in all of our pasta recipes. Here at La Fortezza, rolling out pasta
by hand takes about 10 to 15 minutes and is a great workout, plus it’s meditative and very satisfying. You can, of course,
use a machine; this recipe shares both techniques.
Recipe for fresh tagliatelle:
- 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 eggs
- 4 egg yolks
- All-purpose flour for dusting
Preparation:
Sift the flour add salt , mix in a 2-quart mixing bowl. Add the eggs to the bowl and mix them into the flour to form a dough. Knead the dough until it becomes smooth, about 5 to 10 minutes. Wrap in plastic wrap, and leave to rest in the fridge for 30 minutes to 4 hours before rolling out. Any longer and your risk the dough oxidizing and turning a dark color
Dust a wooden board with 1 tbsp of flour.
Unwrap the dough and flatten it with a rolling pin. Roll out the dough into a thin pasta sheet, to less than 1/8 inch thickness. To cut the pasta sheets into tagliatelle, You can cut the pasta sheet into strips making Tagliatelli, by rolling the sheet like a jelly roll into a 3 inch roll. Cut into ¼ inch strips, starting on the right side of the log, cut 6 cuts then toss the strips unfurling them into pasta nests.
In salted water in a 5 quart pasta pot at a rolling boil add the pasta, cook until pasta rises to the top of the pot, pull one out to sample, it should have a bite or al dente. Serve with your favorite sauce or topping.
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Chapters:
00:00 - Making Fresh Pasta Dough
02:12 - Rolling and Cutting the Pasta
04:43 - Top tip - boil it before eating it
05:25 - Annette's Road Trip
05:53 - Back at La Fortezza
06:23 - Making the Bolognese Sauce
08:23 - Do you smell the alcohol?
09:40 - Cooking the Pasta
10:40 - Leo's Top Tip
11:35 - Plating and Tasting
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