Pork Bolognese Revisited

with Missy Tippens

I'm re-sharing one of my favorite dishes that I posted in December 2011. I love this recipe! I hope you will too...


Missy, here. And I have a fantastic recipe to share. Homey and rich and perfect for a cold day. (Of course, we won't talk about the fact it's going to be 70 degrees today!)

The way this meal started is that I got a deal at the grocery store. :) Ground pork for $1.69 a pound. I grabbed up several packages and then realized I'd never used ground pork before. I had to find a recipe!

The original recipe that I settled on is from the Martha Stewart website. (Click here to see the original.) You'll see as I go that I changed a few things, mainly because I didn't have exactly what I needed. So let's cook!

Pork Bolognese

Ingredients (adapted from MarthaStewart.com)

• 3 slices bacon, finely chopped (I used pre-cooked)
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 1 medium carrot, finely chopped (sometimes I just used pre-shredded carrot sticks and chop them a little more)
• 1 celery stalk, finely chopped (You're getting the picture here...stuff finely chopped!)
• 2 pounds ground pork
• 1/4 cup tomato paste (I normally use a tube of paste, but this is enough to open a small can)
• 1 cup red wine (recipe calls for white, but I used what I had)
• 1-1/4 cups milk
• 1 large can tomato sauce (28 ounces) 
• 2 cups chicken broth
• 1 bay leaf
• 5 sprigs fresh thyme (I never have this fresh. I just crush a pinch of dry thyme between my fingers to release the oils and perk it up a bit)
• salt and pepper
• pasta of your choice (I prefer angel hair because it cooks so quickly)
• Freshly grated Parmesan

In a large heavy pot, cook bacon for about 5 minutes. [Since I used pre-cooked bacon that I had on hand, I just heated through and added a bit of olive oil]

Add onion, carrot, and celery [my family would go on strike if I used celery, so I left out]; cook a few minutes until soft. Raise heat to medium-high and add the pork. Cook, breaking up the meat with your handy dandy potato masher, until browned.

Add tomato paste. Cook until it's mixed well with the pork, about 5 minutes.

Add wine (I didn't have white so used red, which turned out delicious). Cook until the liquid is reduced a good bit. 

Add 1 cup milk (I mixed skim with half & half). Cook until reduced by half. Add tomato sauce, chicken broth, bay leaf, thyme, 2-1/2 teaspoons salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper. Simmer, stirring occasionally, for 1 hour. Stir in another 1/4 cup milk.

[Note: I didn't have an hour. So I cut back to 1-1/2 cups chicken broth and cooked a half hour. It was a little thin but was very tasty anyway.]

Serve sauce over pasta (I used linguine this time), topped with cheese.

For fun, I have a set of pasta dishes that I bought at the grocery store years ago.

I hope you enjoy!!

Do y'all eat as much pasta as we do around here?

www.missytippens.com