Cycle 14 – Item 301
2 (Thu) November 2023
Paccheri in Sunday Gravy
4.0
by me
at home
-Changgok, Sujeong, Seongnam, Gyeonggi, Republic of Korea-
with the Family
Sunday gravy is an Italian-American sauce. Big cuts of meat, typically cheap cuts of beef and/or pork, braised with canned tomatoes and their juices, sometimes tomato paste, sometimes wine, plus garlic and onions, basil and/or oregano, often sausages tossed in at the end. The meats can be served as a separate dish, or along with the gravy on top of pasta . So-called because the cooking takes hours – some recipes call for 8 hours – initiated on a Sunday morning, enjoyed as the centerpiece of the all-important Sunday family dinner. Originating from the ragu traditions of Italy, but blossoming in America with the abundance of meats.
In Italian, sauces go by many names. The term “salsa” usually refers to uncooked sauces, like salad dressings. Cooked sauces, like for pasta, are generally called “sugo.” Specifically, meat sauces are “sugo di carne” or, more specifically by category, “ragu,” or, even more specifically by recipe, “bolognese.” Whether “sugo” should be translated into English as “sauce” or “gravy” is debatable. Italian doesn’t have a separate term for what English speakers commonly think of as gravy – sauce made with flour + butter + stock + meat drippings (e.g., served with roast chicken).
As evidenced by the dialogue in Hollywood gangster movies and television programs, where food is frequently featured, not necessarily as a plot point but simply as a part of daily life, Italian-Americans tend to refer to thick pasta sauces as “gravy.” In Goodfellas, Henry Hill narrates a scene of preparing Sunday family dinner, including Sunday gravy: “I had to start braising the beef, pork butt, and veal shanks for the tomato sauce … I was making ziti with the meat gravy.”
My third attempt in a recent string of meat sauces (see most recently 14.299 Papardelle with Babyback Ribs in Tomato Sauce; 14.294 Lamb Chops with Paccheri in Tomato Sauce), this one the most ambitious in terms of scale (3 kg of meat + 8 cans of tomatoes) and time (6 hours total).
Rather than make the gravy in a single go (e.g., all day Sunday), I started the process yesterday (Wednesday) after dinner, simmering the sauce for about 6 hours until midnight. I finished it tonight (Thursday) by removing the bones, breaking up the meat into smaller pieces and incorporating them into the gravy, then tossing everything with pasta.
Excellent. The gravy, glistening from 6 hours worth of rendered pork fat, was supremely meaty. Texturally, the chunks of pork provided a meatier mouthfeel, in contrast to the crumbliness of bolognese, which involves ground meat. The chunky paccheri was an ideal vehicle for the substantive sauce. Totally worth the effort – and I still have loads left for at least 3 future dinners.
(See also GLOBAL FOOD GLOSSARY)
(See also BOOZE)