food: Isa's sauce

[substitute]

I am making spaghetti sauce. The recipe is a family one from before my birth, when my parents and big brother were living in Bologna. My brother's nanny, Isa, was a pretty serious cook.

It's a bolognese sauce of course, but I am making it with fake meat, so it's a nolognese, or perhaps spaghetti and neatballs.

The ingredients aren't any surprise: tomato, onion, spices, olive oil. The part I don't see so often is carrot, which is shredded or pureed and added for sweetness. This means that I don't have to add salt or something sweet to cut the acidity.

If I'm doing it for vegans or nondairy folks I omit Isa's last step: a tiny amount of milk at the end.

Comments

[substitute.livejournal.com]

Also do you ever brown the meat first?

I do if it's real meat. The fake meat is so sticky and hard to handle that I just slash it into chunks and fling it in.

[salome-st-john.livejournal.com]

We are totally writing a cookbook together.

bloops and chunks, slashing and flinging: COOK WITH THE STARS

[hotelsamurai.livejournal.com]

And flavorwhacking!