Why Ragù Takes All Day

If you wanna make ragù, don’t make any other plans that day.
You can’t rush something that’s meant to cook slowly.

First you render the duck legs.
Then they braise in the oven for hours.
Then they cool.
Then you debone them, remove the skin and fat, pull the meat apart by hand.
Then it goes back into the sauce.
When the meat is shredded this fine, every little strand absorbs the sauce. It’s not meat and sauce anymore. It becomes one thing.

And that only happens because of time.

Time spent letting things sit.
Time breaking it down.
Time letting flavours come together.

Ragù rewards patience.

It’s usually served with pappardelle or tagliatelle, a silky egg fresh noodle.

I was gonna make garganelli on my pettine (a traditional board with strings) someone brought me back from Italy, but it got late, I got lazy, and I had it with dry casarecce. Still slapped. The sauce is rich and dry pasta has more bite, more chew.

What I’m saying is if all your effort goes into the ragù, it’s ok. It’s ok to open a box of pasta. Not the cheap stuff. But good quality dry pasta ? Hell ya.

With a dish like this, it’s not just the ingredients, it’s the time you give them. It’s the kind of sauce that comes together when you leave it the fuck alone.

Just letting it do its thing.

The best things I make now, in the kitchen and outside of it, are the ones I don’t rush.

Ok, later
Em

BEHIND THE PASTA

• Nonna Natalina making pappardelle

• 4000 Weeks (not about food, but time and pace)