The Back Yard Lemon Tree

This vegetable ragu is known as fake sauce (sugo finto) and is a great example of cuisina povera or the frugal food of Italy. In this vegetarian ragu sauce, meat is replaced with vegetables. The flavor is layered into the sauce with a slow cooked soffritto of onions, carrots and celery, which is deglazed with red wine. Sauteed mushrooms are added for extra meatiness, flavour and texture. This technique results in an incredibly rich and flavorsome sauce. Even my son who loves meat bolognese gave high marks to this fake sauce – vegetable ragu.

If you want to keep this dish completely vegan, the pangratatto really elevates the final dish and gives a nutty, crunchy textural contrast to the richness of the sauce.

Fake sauce – Vegetable Ragu

Adapted from Anna Francese Gass via the New York Times

Serves 4

• 2 tablespoons plus 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 500g (1 pound) button mushrooms, cut into 1 cm (1/2 inch) pieces
• Salt and Pepper
• 3 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano or rosemary
• 1 large white onion, finely chopped ( 2 1/2 cups)
• 2 medium carrots, peeled and chopped into 1/2 cm (1/4 inch) pieces (About 1 1/2 cups)
• 2 stalks of celery chopped into 1/2 cm pieces (About 1 heaped cup)
• 3 tablespoons tomato paste
• 1 cup of dry red wine*
• 700 grams 24 ounces) bottle of tomato passata
• 500g ( 1 pound) rigatoni
• Grated parmesan (optional) for serving

For the Pangrattato (optional)

• 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
• 1/4 cup of chopped walnuts
• 1/2 cup of bread crumbs
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3 tablespoons finely chopped parsley

1. To make the sauce. Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a large pan. When oil is very hot put in mushrooms, season with salt and pepper and saute until mushrooms until browned. Add garlic and 1 teaspoon of dried oregano and saute until fragrant. Remove mushrooms from pan into a bowl and set aside.
2. Heat 1/4 of cup of olive oil in pan to medium heat. Add onion, carrot and celery to pan, season with salt and pepper and saute soffritto until sticky and caramelised. (About 10 minutes) Add tomato paste and saute until fragrant. Add red wine to pan and cook until wine has completely evaporated (About 5 minutes)
3. Add passata to soffritto and stir until combined. Add about 1 cup of water (swirled through the passata bottle) Bring to a boil, lower heat and simmer gently uncovered for about 30 minutes.
4. While sauce is cooking make pangrattato. Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a pan. Add chopped walnuts and saute for a couple of minutes. Then add bread crumbs and salt. Saute bread and walnuts until bread is golden. Remove from pan, allow to cool and add chopped parsley to pangrattato.
5. Cook pasta according to packet directions until al dente. Keep 1 cup of pasta water and drain pasta.
6. Add pasta to sauce, loosening sauce with pasta water so the sauce coats the pasta nicely.
7. Serve with pangrattato and grated parmesan if desired.

• If you don’t use alcohol you can deglaze the soffritto with verjuice or a good splash of half and half red wine vinegar and water