Hi!
I'm making Kenji's Bolognese/Lasagna Bolognese from his book The Food Lab and, while it comes out delicious, it always comes out brown with a thick layer of fat on top.
He does say "it will start off creamy, then break, with a fat layer on top, and gradually re-emulsify as it reduces."
Which, I will say, it does. Mid-way through, there's a ton of fat on top and by the end its back to how much it started with - but thats still a ton of fat, which his (based on the pictures and description as creamy) doesn't have. I don't understand how it doesn't - there's 3 lbs of fatty meats cooked in 4 tablespoons of butter.
And based off of his pictures it should be the same color as a Sunday sauce, starting put vibrant red and cooking to a deep ruby red as it summers. Mine starts off ruddy red-brown and cooks to grey-brown...
Again, the sauce is still delicious and makes a means lasagna, I just don't know where I could possibly have went wrong, I quadruple checked everything after the last time.
Thanks!
Brown color is normal from proper browning, cookbook photos are just styled. Skim the fat as you cook or chill it after and scrape it off. With 3lbs meat + butter there's gonna be fat. If it tastes good you're doing it right.
Figured out a part of it, I think. He has you put a lid slightly ajar on it at a bare simmer to reduce - I don't think my electric stove top does that well. I use (iirc also Kenji's) an oven-simmer method for even heating in a Sunday sauce recipe that works well, I'm going to give that a try.
I noticed it was also far too thin and reduced it on higher heat uncovered and that helped with the fat a TON.
I think that’s probably it. I would think a pot on the stove would have the liquid moving more due to liquid at the bottom of the pot being hotter and naturally moving up to the top of the pot in a cycle that slowly emulsifies things.
While the oven does not have as much natural emulsifying since the heat is applied roughly evenly in all directions.
I think the issue came from my interpretation of bare simmer and my stove top. I got my Dutch oven when I lived in an old apartment with a gas range (goddamn I miss that 😭) and it sits over the burner edges on my electric one: only the middle bubbles on lower heats, and I'd say 35-40% doesn't actually touch the burner which sucks.
I think an oven-simmer may work to help deepen the flavors, and after an hour or so move to stove top on med low heat to stir and reduce
As long as some of the liquid is absorbing enough energy to boil water and as long as the steam can escape, it will reduce. (Though the oven also has the advantage of browning exposed pieces of meat)
I've used a hotter and longer simmer than his wording suggests and a lot more of the fat emulsifies. Also, the pictures on that recipe are very misleading.
Yeah, I added an extra 14 oz can of whole tomatoes crushed during the end of the simmer this time and it looks pretty bomb - I'm not gonna lie, the first batch was a dirty-pavement gray-brown that turned me off visually. This one looks MUCH better, and a small amount of tomatoes doesn't change the taste much
He used to be active in this sub so maybe you'll get lucky and get a response 😂