Simple Eats – Spaghetti alla Bolognese with Swedish Meatballs

I love pasta! Incredibly easy as a one-meal dish and but yet, immensely gratifying!

Ingredients (serves 2)

1 large onion, skinned and chopped coarsely

3-4 cloves of garlic, skinned and chopped coarsely

2-3 large tomatoes, deseeded and chopped coarsely

2 tablespoons of olive oil

1/2 packet of spaghetti (around 200-250 g)

1/2 kg of Ikea Swedish meat balls

Parlsey or any fresh herb of preference

1 bottle of Tomato purée (passata di pomodoro)

salt, pepper and sugar to taste

freshly grated parmesan cheese

finely chopped parsley

Add olive oil into a hot pan, followed by the chopped onions. Stir-fry until  the onions go soft slightly and add in chopped garlic. Stir-fry until fragrant and finally, add in the chopped tomatoes. Add salt and pepper to taste. The salt would also cause the tomatoes to undergo osmosis resulting in all the ingredients braising in the sweet juices that ooze out from the tomatoes. Keep the flame low when the tomatoes began to “sweat” .

After around 5 min (I did not keep track of time but rather, cooked based on my intuition, which I’m sure a lot of you do likewise)., pour in the bottle of passata di pomodoro。Rinse out the remnants of the bottle by filling it with 1/2 a bottle of water and giving  it a good shake before emptying the contents onto the puree. Mix everything under well incorporated.

As the ragu thickens, throw in minced beef or pork if you are making traditional Pasta alla Bolognese. But I have a bag of Swedish Meatballs from Ikea, which we absolutely love to eat. Apart from how its served with steamed vegetables and lingoberry sauce in Ikea, we find it an excellent choice for the italiano-amaerican version of Spaghetti Bolognese which uses meatballs as well. For 2 persons, I would say somewhere between a-third to half of the 1 kg packet should suffice. 🙂

Allow the sauce to simmer gently for 10 mins or so. Add more water if the sauce thickens too much in the process. I cook using a pot with non-stick coating but if stainless steel pots are used, stir the contents regularly to prevent the onions from sticking to the base and charring. Do not use aluminium pots as the metal would leach in the acidity of the ragu sauce.

After 10 mins, turn off the heat and replace the lid. Allow the contents to sit for at least 1/2 a day for the flavours to develop. Overnight would be best!

To serve, cook your favorite pasta until al dente and drizzle generously with the ragu sauce. Garnish with grated parmesan and finely chopped parsley.

Waste no time in digging in!

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