Alison Roman's Quick and Easy Ragù _ NYT Cooking

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enguys got some news food it's delicious i'm allison roman and i'm going to be making a quick lamb ragu a ragu in its most simple basic form is a meat sauce that's cooked typically with tomatoes you can serve it over pasta you can serve it over polenta you can kind of do anything you want with it today i'm going to serve it over pasta because pasta so lamb for whatever reason happens to be a very divisive meat and if you're even like a little bit lamb curious then this is a really good gateway recipe to get started because there's a lot of things going on there's tomato there's hot so there's cheese it's like kind of dipping your toes into the waters of lamb or something but i will say that you can use other meats i would stick with something that's just as fatty like pork or like an 80 20 beef so the other nice thing about a sauce like ragu is that it's mostly made with pantry staples you have pasta you have canned tomatoes onions garlic i feel like people sometimes love to add a carrot or something in a meat sauce it's not for me i think that tomatoes offer enough sweetness we're also going to use tomato paste which is going to offer sweetness especially as we caramelize it in the skillet so i don't really think it needs much else other than onion and garlic boring i feel like i'm constantly slicing onions that's like my default for some reason though when i'm using ground meat i always like to chop and we're going to cook them until they're softened so you don't want to make them too big or too chunky and then i'm going to chop four garlic cloves if they're really big feel free to use less if you really like garlic feel free to use more and i'm just going to chop this if you have a garlic press and you're like dying to use it now would be the time so you don't worry about cutting fruit no the garlic is edible no one's going to eat this dragon and be like is there a garlic stem in this because nobody will taste it it doesn't matter it should look like that i am going to get these started onions garlic olive oil saute them salt pepper until they're nice soft translucent and you could definitely do this in a pot as you can see i have limited space and capacity on my stove so i'm going to use a skillet because i've already got a pot going for my water you don't actually need that much olive oil here because the lamb is so fatty so you just need kind of like a thin layer to get things started but once you add the lamb that's going to add most of the fat that's in the sauce and then i'm just going to season them with salt and pepper we're going to wait till it gets kind of soft and translucent we don't want them to be quite browned but we do want them to be totally cooked through because this is a quick lamb ragu to compensate for the time that we're not simmering it you know developing all those flavors we're going to kind of cheat it a little bit by adding anchovies and tomato paste so these are two ingredients that add a ton of flavor in a very short period of time for tomato paste i really like the kind that comes in a tube which tends to be double concentrated which means that it's a little bit thicker a little bit richer but regular tomato paste in a can is also fine a good way to tell if your anchovies are good is that they should look pink and meaty and not smell fishy they should smell just kind of like salty and a little bit briny almost like olives these ones i really really like they're firm which means they are well cured and salted i love anchovies oh my god i gave these anchovies to a person who had never had anchovies and they were very scared to try them and they told me they were so surprised at how much they liked them and then it kind of just reminded them of like prosciutto or something like that so it's not unlike that it has like a cured meat vibe except there's a fish our onions are starting to get really nicely like lightly browned they're translucent and they smell very very good i'm gonna add a pinch of red pepper flakes because i like my ragu to be a little spicy lamb especially really likes spiciness and then anchovies i left them optional in the recipe but i feel like most people from what i've seen when they were cooking this recipe have embraced the anchovy which makes me extremely happy the nice thing about cooking with anchovies you don't have to cut them you don't have to chop them they just kind of dissolve in the oil you know they're not adding a fishiness to it they're just adding like a deep meaty richness look where'd they go i don't know you tell me this is all like a great thing to do for somebody who claims they don't like anchovies is to put them in the sauce and then serve it to them and they're going to be like oh my god this lamborgh it's amazing and you're gonna be like i know it's full of anchovies joke's on you cool so once those anchovies are all melted now i'm going to add my tomato paste fresh tube i feel like this is all like a toothpaste thing or if you squeeze from here you're a monster so i like to go from the top and do about two tablespoons wait if you squeeze from the thick part you're a monster yeah that's absolutely where i squeeze my toothpaste yeah and then you get toothpaste here toothpaste there well then it's a mess and then you've got all this unusable toothpaste you always go from the top i don't think i've ever heard that or not where were you raised in north carolina well i'm never i mean i'd ever go there so that's all happening in there and now i'm gonna add my meat like i built this dish with lamb in mind like the anchovies the tomatoes the chili you could absolutely use another ground meat if that's your thing ground meat not a cute thing and i'm going to season this definitely with lots of salt and pepper i want to make sure that as it cooks that the onions the tomato paste the garlic the anchovies are all kind of incorporated into the meat for two reasons one because it starts to season the meat immediately and two that way those other bits like the onions the garlic etc don't burn in the skillet before the meat is browned cool so now that everything is incorporated i can see everything mingling and getting to know each other in a skillet they're having a great time oh my god what a fun party in here um i'm good to walk away i don't need to stand here over the skillet and watch it necessarily and there's a lot of fat and lamb so as it cooks a lot of that fat is going to come out and it's going to protect it from browning or burning too quickly so it looks saucy and nice now we're going to let it get even saucier and nicer the lamb will tell you when it's ready and basically what you're looking for is browning in the bottom of the skillet which is really nice because once we add our tomatoes and some water all those bits are going to get pulled up into the sauce for this ragu you can use whole peeled tomatoes that you crush by hand or you can use canned crushed tomatoes they're going to give you slightly different textures in the end but both are totally usable i'm going to use these whole peeled tomatoes that i'm going to crush myself because that's what i've got i'm gonna add the liquid first and then to crush the tomatoes i just crush them over the skillet by hand like this it's actually quite a fun task i like this part a lot i like it probably more than i should i'll use the can as the vessel for which to add the water and it's just nice because then you can get all the bits inside and then i like to put my spoon in there isn't that cute oh my god i'm gonna give it another seasoning of salt and pepper we gotta make sure that they get seasoned too we're gonna simmer it for about 25 to 30 minutes while i'm doing that i'm going to get my water going for my pasta that way everything is ready at the same time the nice thing about ragu is that you can really serve it with any type of pasta you can use short to be noodle you can use long thin noodle whatever you like i personally love like a long kind of thicker strand like a fettuccine or a bucatini for something like this but if you're like i just gotta have a rigatoni then by all means use a rigatoni so i'm going to use about three quarters of this box which will still be so much for four people you're like no no you don't know me and my family like we eat a lot of pasta i eat a lot of pasta and i still feel like 10 to 12 ounces for four people is plenty so i'm gonna drop it into my heavily salted pasta water and while this finishes cooking for most pastas i would say like check it after eight minutes it probably won't be ready till ten but a good way to find out how long you should cook your pasta for is just look at the box because each brand has a different thickness each brand has a different time for how long you should cook it so best to consult where it comes from then listen to a generic recipe because they don't know where your pasta came from for the ragu i feel like it's better to kind of air on maybe too thick than too thin because if it's too thin it's going to be kind of watery and not as flavorful as it can be and if it's on the thicker side you can always thin it out with some of your pasta water but this to me looks perfect so i'm not even going to drain the pasta it's going to go straight into the skillet and that's why i like tongs so i also like to cook my pasta in the sauce that i'm serving it with not only does it season the pasta from the inside out but it also thickens the sauce some of that starch from the pasta is going to come out and it's going to thicken your sauce which just gives you that like very nice noodle coating experience as always we will test one noodle one chosen noodle extremely hot is delicious and seasoned and so so good so to serve this you can go straight from skillet to table if that's your thing or you can put this in a giant bowl i'm just gonna make myself one very nice cute little nest of pasta because it's just me here alone in this kitchen definitely not a room full of people filming me do this i like to absolutely shower it with cheese and then some olive oil i love oregano and lamb so this to me is like an obvious choice for oregano but if you'd rather go like a fresh herb use something like parsley would be really nice too oh i'm going to add some more chili flakes because i like it spicy so there's our quick little mercury eating pasta on camera not in my list of favorite things to do but i'll always do it because i love pasta it's so good trick the lamb haters trick the anchovy haters trick everyone in your life no i don't think you should do that i think honesty is the way to live your life but i do think that this is a really good gateway dish for both of those ingredients that can be a little polarizingguys got some news food it's delicious i'm allison roman and i'm going to be making a quick lamb ragu a ragu in its most simple basic form is a meat sauce that's cooked typically with tomatoes you can serve it over pasta you can serve it over polenta you can kind of do anything you want with it today i'm going to serve it over pasta because pasta so lamb for whatever reason happens to be a very divisive meat and if you're even like a little bit lamb curious then this is a really good gateway recipe to get started because there's a lot of things going on there's tomato there's hot so there's cheese it's like kind of dipping your toes into the waters of lamb or something but i will say that you can use other meats i would stick with something that's just as fatty like pork or like an 80 20 beef so the other nice thing about a sauce like ragu is that it's mostly made with pantry staples you have pasta you have canned tomatoes onions garlic i feel like people sometimes love to add a carrot or something in a meat sauce it's not for me i think that tomatoes offer enough sweetness we're also going to use tomato paste which is going to offer sweetness especially as we caramelize it in the skillet so i don't really think it needs much else other than onion and garlic boring i feel like i'm constantly slicing onions that's like my default for some reason though when i'm using ground meat i always like to chop and we're going to cook them until they're softened so you don't want to make them too big or too chunky and then i'm going to chop four garlic cloves if they're really big feel free to use less if you really like garlic feel free to use more and i'm just going to chop this if you have a garlic press and you're like dying to use it now would be the time so you don't worry about cutting fruit no the garlic is edible no one's going to eat this dragon and be like is there a garlic stem in this because nobody will taste it it doesn't matter it should look like that i am going to get these started onions garlic olive oil saute them salt pepper until they're nice soft translucent and you could definitely do this in a pot as you can see i have limited space and capacity on my stove so i'm going to use a skillet because i've already got a pot going for my water you don't actually need that much olive oil here because the lamb is so fatty so you just need kind of like a thin layer to get things started but once you add the lamb that's going to add most of the fat that's in the sauce and then i'm just going to season them with salt and pepper we're going to wait till it gets kind of soft and translucent we don't want them to be quite browned but we do want them to be totally cooked through because this is a quick lamb ragu to compensate for the time that we're not simmering it you know developing all those flavors we're going to kind of cheat it a little bit by adding anchovies and tomato paste so these are two ingredients that add a ton of flavor in a very short period of time for tomato paste i really like the kind that comes in a tube which tends to be double concentrated which means that it's a little bit thicker a little bit richer but regular tomato paste in a can is also fine a good way to tell if your anchovies are good is that they should look pink and meaty and not smell fishy they should smell just kind of like salty and a little bit briny almost like olives these ones i really really like they're firm which means they are well cured and salted i love anchovies oh my god i gave these anchovies to a person who had never had anchovies and they were very scared to try them and they told me they were so surprised at how much they liked them and then it kind of just reminded them of like prosciutto or something like that so it's not unlike that it has like a cured meat vibe except there's a fish our onions are starting to get really nicely like lightly browned they're translucent and they smell very very good i'm gonna add a pinch of red pepper flakes because i like my ragu to be a little spicy lamb especially really likes spiciness and then anchovies i left them optional in the recipe but i feel like most people from what i've seen when they were cooking this recipe have embraced the anchovy which makes me extremely happy the nice thing about cooking with anchovies you don't have to cut them you don't have to chop them they just kind of dissolve in the oil you know they're not adding a fishiness to it they're just adding like a deep meaty richness look where'd they go i don't know you tell me this is all like a great thing to do for somebody who claims they don't like anchovies is to put them in the sauce and then serve it to them and they're going to be like oh my god this lamborgh it's amazing and you're gonna be like i know it's full of anchovies joke's on you cool so once those anchovies are all melted now i'm going to add my tomato paste fresh tube i feel like this is all like a toothpaste thing or if you squeeze from here you're a monster so i like to go from the top and do about two tablespoons wait if you squeeze from the thick part you're a monster yeah that's absolutely where i squeeze my toothpaste yeah and then you get toothpaste here toothpaste there well then it's a mess and then you've got all this unusable toothpaste you always go from the top i don't think i've ever heard that or not where were you raised in north carolina well i'm never i mean i'd ever go there so that's all happening in there and now i'm gonna add my meat like i built this dish with lamb in mind like the anchovies the tomatoes the chili you could absolutely use another ground meat if that's your thing ground meat not a cute thing and i'm going to season this definitely with lots of salt and pepper i want to make sure that as it cooks that the onions the tomato paste the garlic the anchovies are all kind of incorporated into the meat for two reasons one because it starts to season the meat immediately and two that way those other bits like the onions the garlic etc don't burn in the skillet before the meat is browned cool so now that everything is incorporated i can see everything mingling and getting to know each other in a skillet they're having a great time oh my god what a fun party in here um i'm good to walk away i don't need to stand here over the skillet and watch it necessarily and there's a lot of fat and lamb so as it cooks a lot of that fat is going to come out and it's going to protect it from browning or burning too quickly so it looks saucy and nice now we're going to let it get even saucier and nicer the lamb will tell you when it's ready and basically what you're looking for is browning in the bottom of the skillet which is really nice because once we add our tomatoes and some water all those bits are going to get pulled up into the sauce for this ragu you can use whole peeled tomatoes that you crush by hand or you can use canned crushed tomatoes they're going to give you slightly different textures in the end but both are totally usable i'm going to use these whole peeled tomatoes that i'm going to crush myself because that's what i've got i'm gonna add the liquid first and then to crush the tomatoes i just crush them over the skillet by hand like this it's actually quite a fun task i like this part a lot i like it probably more than i should i'll use the can as the vessel for which to add the water and it's just nice because then you can get all the bits inside and then i like to put my spoon in there isn't that cute oh my god i'm gonna give it another seasoning of salt and pepper we gotta make sure that they get seasoned too we're gonna simmer it for about 25 to 30 minutes while i'm doing that i'm going to get my water going for my pasta that way everything is ready at the same time the nice thing about ragu is that you can really serve it with any type of pasta you can use short to be noodle you can use long thin noodle whatever you like i personally love like a long kind of thicker strand like a fettuccine or a bucatini for something like this but if you're like i just gotta have a rigatoni then by all means use a rigatoni so i'm going to use about three quarters of this box which will still be so much for four people you're like no no you don't know me and my family like we eat a lot of pasta i eat a lot of pasta and i still feel like 10 to 12 ounces for four people is plenty so i'm gonna drop it into my heavily salted pasta water and while this finishes cooking for most pastas i would say like check it after eight minutes it probably won't be ready till ten but a good way to find out how long you should cook your pasta for is just look at the box because each brand has a different thickness each brand has a different time for how long you should cook it so best to consult where it comes from then listen to a generic recipe because they don't know where your pasta came from for the ragu i feel like it's better to kind of air on maybe too thick than too thin because if it's too thin it's going to be kind of watery and not as flavorful as it can be and if it's on the thicker side you can always thin it out with some of your pasta water but this to me looks perfect so i'm not even going to drain the pasta it's going to go straight into the skillet and that's why i like tongs so i also like to cook my pasta in the sauce that i'm serving it with not only does it season the pasta from the inside out but it also thickens the sauce some of that starch from the pasta is going to come out and it's going to thicken your sauce which just gives you that like very nice noodle coating experience as always we will test one noodle one chosen noodle extremely hot is delicious and seasoned and so so good so to serve this you can go straight from skillet to table if that's your thing or you can put this in a giant bowl i'm just gonna make myself one very nice cute little nest of pasta because it's just me here alone in this kitchen definitely not a room full of people filming me do this i like to absolutely shower it with cheese and then some olive oil i love oregano and lamb so this to me is like an obvious choice for oregano but if you'd rather go like a fresh herb use something like parsley would be really nice too oh i'm going to add some more chili flakes because i like it spicy so there's our quick little mercury eating pasta on camera not in my list of favorite things to do but i'll always do it because i love pasta it's so good trick the lamb haters trick the anchovy haters trick everyone in your life no i don't think you should do that i think honesty is the way to live your life but i do think that this is a really good gateway dish for both of those ingredients that can be a little polarizing\n"