Healthified Bolognese And a Bonus MSG Rant

One of my husband's favourite things to eat is pasta with bolognese. Normally, I make it with Italian sausage, ground beef, tons of kosher salt and olive oil. Clearly, my much loved version would not, in any universe, by considered "heart healthy" even with a bag of magic beans but a life without bolognese is not a life worth living. 

We have not had any beef or real pasta in a month so I decided it was time to healthify our sauce and because every whole wheat pasta I have bought has been soundly PooPooed, I cut the difference with fibre enriched white pasta and we will just eat smaller portions, less often. 

This was my first try and I don't think I am going to change anything, to be honest. I added in a bit of carrot and fennel to make up for the lack of fennel seed etc in the sausage and give it a bit more flavour and pretty much replaced half the ground beef with ground mushrooms a la my usual Blend and Extend mushroom magic . You can cut the fat in this recipe even more if you can find extra lean beef but this was the leanest meat I could get my hands on. 

Here is my basic sauce that uses only Italian Sausage and although I only ever say "salt to taste", trust me, I salt to taste. You can just FEEL the fat from the sausages in this picture

The finished healthified sauce feels just as meaty - thank you ground mushrooms- and, because I decided not to skimp on the olive oil, it was still rich and thick. A bit of red wine and no sodium chicken broth also helped bump up the jam and if you want to leave out the MSG, leave it out but you will probably have to add quite a bit more salt to achieve the same results.

Okay, regarding the MSG. There is no documented proof that MSG is any more harmful than salt is. Here is a quick explanation of what MSG is about, good and bad and the bottom line, is that it is condidered safe in moderate amounts, like salt. When used in tomato based dishes (tomatoes are a natural source of glutamate, as are mushrooms and parmesan - see a common thread in this dish?), it allows you to use less salt without sacrificing flavour. If you skip it, you will probably have to use more salt.

"MSG is the sodium salt of glutamic acid, an amino acid found in your body and most foods."

I could go on for an hour about the racist undertones of the anti MSG rhetoric but you can google and read for yourself. Better yet, watch David Chang's Ugly Delicious, season 1, episode 7 where he explores racism and Asian food and makes a room full of white people face their MSG predjudices. 

Healthier Bolognese

Makes about 10 cups of sauce

1/4 cup olive oil

1 onion, small dice

1/4 cup fine dice fennel

1/2 large carrot, fine dice

3 cloves garlic, finely chopped

227 g mushrooms, pulsed in food processor

250 g lean ground beef

1 tbls tomato paste

3/4 tsp kosher salt (I always use kosher salt, but a good salt is good too. Keep in mind that the finer the actual salt, the less volume you will use - if you are using table salt, just stop that right now)

1/2 cup red wine

1/2 cup no sodium chicken broth

5 cups no salt added passata

1 can whole san marzano tomatoes

1/2 tsp msg

*entire recipe has approx 1840mg of sodium, the beef had about 42g fat and 54 g fat in the olive oil

the recipe makes enough for at least 10 generous servings - what a serving size looks like is up to you

Heat a large pot over med-high heat (medium if you are using enamaled cast iron like Le Crueset) and when it's hot, add the olive oil and sauted the onion, fennel and carrot until softened, about 4 or 5 minutes. Throw in the ground mushrooms and salt and continue to cook a few more minutes until the mushrooms start releasing water. When the water is pretty much evaporated, add in the beef and keep cooking until the meat is no longer pink. Push all the solids to the side and add in the tomato paste and fry it for a couple of minutes until it starts to deepen in colour and when that happens, stir it into the mushroom/meat mixture.

Pour in the red wine, let is cook off for a minute before you add in the tomatoes and the chicken broth.
You can either squish the whole tomatoes through your fingers or, if you want a smooth sauce, use an immersion blender or the food processor to puree the canned tomatoes roughly.

Let the whole thing simmer gently for at least 45 minutes but an hour is even better. Serve over your favourite pasta.

Keep in mind that if you add freshly grated parmesan, you are adding more sodium - approx 77mg sodium per tbls of grated cheese, so keep that in mind.