Meat ragout with mushrooms

Minced meat is one of the most common ingredients in most of our foods and portions. This dish is an alternative to Bolognese ragout which I love to eat, but sometimes it is good to have a new perspective on a beloved meal. By adding more vegetables, it becomes more healthier and gives it more texture.

I was inspired with one food photo, where I saw carved mushrooms, so I thought it could be attractive to add the carved mushrooms to this ragout. If you don’t want to spend too much time with the decoration, you can just directly add the sliced mushrooms to the pan without previously frying them. But I think it is a great idea how to make a regular dish a bit fancier.

In this ragout I like the intense colors and flavors, it has a deep taste in which you can feel the meet, tomatoes and herbs. It goes very well with a glass of wine and a good company.

The ending twist is to add a bit of truffle olive oil on the top right before eating, it adds an extra flavor to the mushrooms in the ragout and gives you that plus which should be in each and every meal that we eat.

Ingredients:

• 900 gr minced meet (I used a mixture of beef and pork (max. 10% fat))
• 1 onion chopped
• 2 gloves of garlic crushed
• 250 gr of mushrooms (champignons) sliced
• 1 small carrot finely chopped
• 3-4 cubes of frozen spinach (just for the color)
• 2-3 tbsp of olive oil
• a bit of dry vine, per taste (I always use the one that is open at that moment, but for this dish if possible, I would preferably use red vine)
• 1 tbsp tomato paste
• few cherry tomatoes quartered
• canned tomato pulp (appr. 350-400 gr)
• salt and pepper to taste
• italian herbs
• chopped fresh parsley
• grated hard cheese on the top for serving
• pasta of your choice

Preparation:

1. Heat the olive oil in a deep pan on a middle-high heat and add the chopped onions. Sauté until soft for about 5 minutes.
2. Add the carrots and after 2-3 minutes add the meet. After adding the meat usually, I turn up the heat just for few minutes to brown the meat.
3. Add wine, boil it until the alcohol evaporates, add the crushed garlic and put on a low heat.
4. Add the tomato paste and the canned tomato pulp. You can use the canned tomatoes that are already chopped or you can use whole tomatoes (in this case you need to cut them before adding).
5. Season with salt pepper and herbs and simmer for about an hour.
6. At the same time slice the mushrooms, cut the pattern on the mushrooms and fry them on both sides on a dry pan. When the ragout is almost ready add the pre-fried mushrooms and the spinach. Simmer for 15 more minutes. At the very end add the parsley and the cherry tomatoes.
7. Serve with pasta and grated cheese.