When there isn't time for bolognese: simple meat sauce

As you all know, perhaps too well, Annalena is no fan of "quick" cooking. Good food takes its own time. And in any event, there are any number of dishes that do not take all that much time, and are wonderful. I turn now, however, to what some may view as an exception to one of Annalena's precepts. I respectfully dissent from that view.
This recipe resulted from necessity. It was one of those evenings when I actually had no idea what I was going to cook for dinner. I had not thawed any proteins, which is not usually a stopper, but looking at the refrigerator's contents was making me a bit depressed. Pasta is my universal "go to" dish in situations like this, but what to put on it as a sauce? Butter and cheese was not sounding like the right thing. Yes, there were vegetables in the fridge, but they were of the sturdy winter vegetable type, as well as two big bunches of escarole. They were destined to a side dish, and I was running out of ideas.
There was an ample pound of ground veal in the freezer, and my wicked mind got to work: meat sauce. One of the useful things about chopped meat, is that even if it is not completely thawed, you can cook with it, if it is soft enough to break into manageable sized pieces. Annalena refuses to allow a microwave oven in her kitchen, but remembered Nana thawing chopped meat in a big pot of hot water. That is in fact what I did, and it worked. Within half an hour , that solid block of frozen meat, was completely thawed. And we were ready to go to work.

Let me say up front that this sauce does not have the subtlety and depth of flavor of a slow cooked bolognese. It better not. For a quick winter supper, however, this was superb. It does depend on you having good tomato sauce at your disposal. If you don't, shame on you. I shall repeat the recipe here after we get to "the meat of the matter."

I did this with ground veal ("Of course she did," I can hear some of you saying). But you could do this with any ground meat: beef is obvious, as is pork, but try lamb or turkey too. Or, mix em up. I think the key thing here is to season it well enough and to make sure you have enough onions in the mix.

Chop two medium onions fine, and also smash and chop 3-4 cloves of garlic. Pout enough olive oil into a pan to just coat it. Then, add the onions, the garlic and the chopped meat, all at once, together with about a teaspoon and a half of salt.

Note that I combined everything at once. This is something I learned when I was studying chili recipes. I was always taught to saute' the vegetables first, and then add the meat, but this technique seems to let the meat pick up some of the wonderful flavors from the onions.

Here is where you will do what work you WILL do in this sauce. Just keep on stirring and turning, until the color of the meat has gone from red, to pink to just brown. Now, an optional step, taken from classic bolognese. Pour in about 6 ounces of white wine, and stir it around, letting the wine evaporate. (As I think about it, why limit to white? Use red if you have it, too). When the wine has evaporated, stir in about a cup of tomato sauce and lower the heat. Do nothing, but listen. When you start hearing a crackle, stir things one last time, and turn off the heat. You're done.

This is not a "soupy" sauce. There is almost no liquid in it at all. you may even wonder where the tomato sauce is. It's there, as you'll find when you taste it. There's enough here to do about a pound of pasta, and it's a good meal. You may not even want to put grated cheese on it.

Now, for a review: to make that tomato sauce, you need good quality canned tomatoes. Whole ones. Do not use puree, do not use chopped. If you have a blender, puree them yourself. If you don't, get over the EWWWWW factor and crush them with your hands, and keep the juice. Use either 28 or 35 ounce cans, it doen't much matter, and always use at least 3 cans at a time.

For each can of the tomatoes, count on half a medium onion, chopped, and four cloves of garlic. You will also need sauce, and bay leaves , or some other seasoning. Here is a time where, if you have a dry "Italian seasonings" you like, use it.

Cover a large pot with enough olive oil, and then saute' the onions, with a teaspoon of salt, until they go to translucent. Then add half of the tomatoes, and all of the garlic. Follow with the rest of the tomatoes (this is a ridiculous step, but it works for me. Indulge the old lady). Stir the whole thing, lower the heat, and then add about a tablespoon of your seasoning, and/or two bay leaves. Taste, and add the salt you will need (because you will), underseasoning, as the sauce is going to reduce.

Cover the pot, lower the heat, and let it cook away for half an hour. Then, come back, uncover the pot, stir again, and cook for another half an hour. It is probably thick enough for you at this time, but if you like a heavier sauce, cook for another half hour, and keep in mind that you'll want to stir this every now and then to keep it from scorching.

You'll get PLENTY of tomato sauce from this. Probably 2 quarts. And you can freeze it, so you're set.

Make yourself some tomato sauce. It's one of Annalena's "money in the bank" ingredients, and then indulge yourself with this simple meat sauce. Dinner in half an hour. Who can complain?