I chose to make Pappardelle alla Bolognese for my midterm noodle project because my favorite types of pasta dishes are those that consist of a rich, filling meat sauce and thick, long noodles to absorb all the flavors of the ragù. I would prefer to eat this dish during an especially cold winter night so the thick meat sauce and pasta could warm me up. The ingredients were ones I was familiar with, as I have attempted to make my own variations of a tomato-based meat sauce, except I had usually used ground turkey as a leaner alternative to beef.

Bolognese can be made in large batches to feed the whole family. As it is a rich, indulgent sauce with lots of meat, Pellegrino Artusi would suggest consuming Bolognese for dinner. Pappardelle alla Bolognese is a simple dish that can be served on any occasion, whether it be for a weeknight meal or a celebratory affair with extended family and friends. The ragù is decadent and dominated by meat; therefore, this dish contains a significant amount of protein.

Bolognese sauce originated in Bologna, Italy and is traditionally served with tagliatelle pasta. While most of us are familiar with “spaghetti Bolognese,” the dish is generally considered inauthentic. Bolognese was first referenced in Pellegrino Artusi’s 1891 cookbook, The Science of Cooking and the Art of Eating Well. His version simply consists of veal, bacon, butter, onion, carrot, celery, flour, and broth—the lack of tomato makes it almost unrecognizable in comparison to what we eat at restaurants today. The recipe has evolved since then to accommodate individual preferences and many modern interpretations, including white wine, pork, and, of course, tomato. Bolognese is unique given its incorporation of the flavors of different meats. In my recipe, I combine ground beef, ground pork, and diced pancetta. Bolognese is a ragù, meaning that it is a thick meat sauce cooked over a low heat for many hours. The base of the ragù is the soffrito, a mixture of minced carrots, onions, and celery. The soffrito is sautéed in butter or oil and then combined with ground beef, ground pork, and pancetta. Passata (tomato purée, instead of actual tomatoes), white wine, and milk are finally added to the sauce, which is then allowed to simmer and thicken for hours. This is the “official” recipe of ragù alla bolognese that was registered with the Bologna Chamber of Commerce by the Italian Academy of Cuisine in 1982.

For this project, I had to trust in my judgement and ability as a cook to incorporate aspects of several different recipes into one dish. Some recipes suggested I use just beef, some combine beef and pork, and some, including Artusi’s recipe, contained pancetta. I decided to go for it and blend all three. I opted not to use white wine in my sauce because we do not keep wine at home and I do not enjoy the flavor. I made another substitution out of necessity with the pasta and elected to use store-bought egg pappardelle instead of the traditional tagliatelle. I actually did attempt to make the tagliatelle from scratch but ended up with an egg-y and flour-y mess in the kitchen, which my mom was not especially thrilled about. The very next day, I went to Trader Joe’s and bought the pappardelle. I found it interesting that many recipes failed to mention garlic. As an Indian who was raised to believe that garlic should be included in practically every savory dish, I found this to be blasphemous and decided to include five cloves in my recipe.

Making this dish actually turned out to be quite the disaster… but not for a lack of trying! I spent a good bit of time carefully slicing celery, intricately chopping carrots, and delicately dicing onions. I travelled around Charlotte in my mask and gloves trying to find pappardelle and good quality pancetta. In the end, my downfall was a lack of awareness. I realized, too late in the cooking process, that the ground meat I had used had expired. I went grocery shopping for my ingredients the week before I actually cooked the dish because I wasn’t feeling well during the days immediately after my shopping. I incorrectly assumed that the meat was still safe to use, after all it had only been a couple of days, but I was proven to be so very wrong. The ground pork and beef looked fine to me, but after mixing the meat with the rest of the sauce’s components, I started to clean up and noticed an expiry date on the meat’s packaging. Unfortunately, the expiry dates of meats do not allow for a lot of flexibility. It was too late to go out and purchase new ingredients so I was stuck with my rancid ragù. I was forced to make a meal that I knew would probably be inedible, just so I could produce some sort of final product to display. A small part of me was still hopeful that it could be consumed so my poor mother, who had just returned from the hospital after dutifully caring for coronavirus patients, was served my horrid, rotten dish. She tried to be polite but was forced to spit out her first and only bite. I ended up throwing everything in the trash. I can’t help but chuckle when reflecting back on this experience because sometimes things go laughably wrong and you just have to accept it and move on otherwise the frustration will consume you. Next time, I will definitely make sure I am aware of the time limit on my ingredients’ freshness, but this ordeal taught me how to not let small setbacks defeat me.