Goat bolognese sauce is a take on one of the most famous Italian meat sauces. Bolognese ragu is from Bologna, a town in Italy known for it’s 1000 year-old university as well as the famous pasta sauce.
The constant parts of the sauce, are ground meat, tomato, wine, and some sort of dairy, typically milk or the addition of cream at the end. To make cooking more streamlined, you can grind all of the meat and vegetables together if you like.
You can grind the meat and vegetables together if you have a meat grinder. Or just use ground goat meat.
How to Make the Goat Pasta Sauce
The recipe is easy: the meat is cooked into a simple sauce with ground carrot, onion, and celery, wine, milk, tomato, and herbs. The mixture simmers slowly for an hour or two, and, from there, can be frozen or stored for months at a time. Straight from the pot after cooking, the ragu will taste great, but for a real restaurant style dish, try Chef’s tutorial for heating up scoops of the cooled sauce with a splash of tomato, parsley, and a knob of butter.
To reheat, start with a small amount of tomato sauce.
Add the cooled ragu.
Add pasta, butter, parmesan and parsley. Heat through.
Finally, toss together, and taste.
Remove the pasta, spooning the ragu on top.
Finish with parmesan.
This recipe is by chef Alan Bergo. A chef from Minnesota, Alan is a veteran of the culinary industry, former executive chef of acclaimed Lucia’s Restaurant, and the Salt Cellar. He’s best known as a respected authority on Midwestern foraging. Learn more about Alan and his hunt for mushrooms, wild and obscure foods at his site Forager Chef.
A take on the classic Italian pasta sauce using grass fed goat meat. Serves 4-6
Course Main Course
Cuisine Italian
Keyword Bolognese, Goat Hearts, Grass Fed, Offal
Prep Time 20 minutesminutes
Cook Time 2 hourshours
Total Time 2 hourshours20 minutesminutes
Servings 8servings
Calories 359kcal
Cost 10
Equipment
Meat grinder
Pasta pot
Wide saute pan or skillet
Ingredients
2lbsground goat meat
5ozlamb bellyor pork pancetta, cubed (optional)
25gramsgarlic cloveswhole
1rib of celery chopped
1medium carrot chopped
1small onion chopped
1cuphalf and half
1cupdry white wine
1 28ozcan whole peeled tomatoes
¼cuptomato paste
2dried bay leaves
1Tablespoonchopped fresh thyme
1teaspoonkosher salt
Fresh ground black pepperto taste
For serving
High quality parmesan cheeseto taste
4tablespoonsunsalted butter
3/4cupTomato sauce
2 Tablespoons chopped Italian parsley
Instructions
Bolognese
Roughly chop the vegetables and garlic and pulse in a food processor.
Add the pancetta to a Dutch oven and cook on medium high heat to render the fat. Remove the pancetta, then brown the goat meat in the fat. Remove the goat meat and reserve with the pancetta.
Add the vegetable mixture and cook until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the pancetta, wine, tomato, half and half, fresh thyme and bay leaves.
Bring the mixture to a simmer and cook on low for 1.5-2 hours, or until the sauce is thickened and delicious.
To serve, double check the seasoning, adjust as needed, stir in the butter and parsley, then ladle over cooked noodles with parmesan on the side.
To serve as you would eat in a restaurant.
For 4 servings, heat 3/4 cup of tomato puree in a pan, then add 2.5 cups of cooled ragu, heat through, double check the seasoning and adjust, add parmesan to taste along with 4 tablespoons of butter, and toss with the pasta directly in the pan, heat for a minute or to so the flavors can meld, finally, finish with the parsley and serve.
Notes
Resist the urge to substitute bacon for the belly or pancetta, the smoked flavor will take over the subtle flavors of the heart.