Megan’s White Pork Ragu

This recipe is one of my go to dishes to cook when I have friends coming round for dinner at the last minute and I want to try to impress them while still doing something simple, but delicious! I was actually inspired to cook my first pork ragu years ago after Vicky made me a delicious bianco sugo and now it has become one of my partner’s favourite meals that he’ll request I cook for him (which is fair enough as he does more of the cooking at home than me!) Please adapt it as your own, you can make it not bianco and add passata. You can also use cuts of pork and slow cook it or even better, use a pressure cooker to speed things up! I find the pork mince very quick and easy though, and mince is usually very easy to find. Enjoy!

Ingredients

For the ragu:

2 tbsp Olive Oil
1 medium onion, diced
2 carrots, diced
2 sticks of celery, diced
150g chopped up streaky bacon (or diced pancetta)
500g pork mince
Salt and black pepper
3 garlic cloves, minced or diced
125ml dry white wine
400ml chicken stock
2-3 large bay leaves
2 tsp dried thyme (or 2tbsp fresh thyme)
2 tsp dried sage (or 2tbsp fresh sage, finely chopped)
Juice from half a lemon
2tsp honey
Grated lemon zest (optional)
A splash (1-2tbsp) of whole milk or cream (or pasta water)

For the pasta:

75g-100g per person of dried tagliatelle or bucatini. Or serve with your own homemade fresh pasta, such as tagliatelle, gnocchi or cavatelli!

To serve:

Drizzle Olive oil
50g grated Parmigiano

Method

Finely dice your carrots, celery and onion to make up your soffritto base.
Glug olive oil into a cast iron pot or large saucepan on a medium heat. Throw in your soffritto mix and cook until softened.
In a separate frying pan, fry up your bacon or pancetta until golden brown. Add the cooked bacon or pancetta to the soffritto (making sure you add all that flavourful pork fat from the bacon or pancetta).
Next, add the pork mince, and make sure to break it up well with a wooden spoon or spatula. Season the meat well with salt and black pepper. I am very generous with the pepper as find it gives the finished ragu a lovely gentle heat. Cook the mince until there is no longer any pink left, stirring so it cooks evenly and breaks up thoroughly.
Finely dice the garlic cloves and add to the pork mince, stirring it through the meat mixture.
Now add the dry white wine. Simmer until you’ve cooked off the alcohol, you can tell this either from when it’s reduced to about half the amount of liquid, or often I just do it by smell, so when it stops smelling of alcohol.
Next add the 400ml of good quality chicken stock.
Add your herb mixture (bay leaves, thyme and sage) and season with more salt and plenty of pepper.
Add juice from half a lemon.
Stir and allow to simmer for 30-45 mins until the liquid has reduced.
If a little acidic, add two teaspoons of honey to sweeten and stir through.
Grate in a little lemon zest from the earlier lemon half you juiced.
To finish, I like to add a splash of whole milk (or you can use cream) just to give it an extra bit of decadence. You don’t need much at all – 1 to 2 tbsp will do fine.
Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Put on your pasta. Cook the pasta in salted boiling water. Drain when cooked, and if your pork ragu needs slackening or is looking dry, add a spoonful of the pasta water to the ragu.
Drizzle the pasta with olive oil (or butter if preferred) and place into bowls.
Ladle the ragu onto the pasta (pick out the bay leaves if desired), and finish with another drizzle of olive oil, and a generous grating of Parmigiano.

Buon appetito!

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