Goat is G.O.A.T. for braised and ragù meats
ingredients for 4 servings (cost about 5 € pp)
- Salt
- 320 g paccheri
- 500 g goat shoulder
- the solid part of a can with whole tomatoes
- 60 ml white wine
- 1/2 litre vegetable stock
- 0,125 g (half portion) saffron powder
- 1 large onion
- Ground black pepper
- Fresh oregano
- EV olive oil
- 100 g fresh porcini mushrooms
- 100 g fresh Caesar mushrooms
People who follow our site already know that I consider goat and kid meat the best available for braised and ragù. Why?
Because of their nutrition and their habits. Goats and kids are animals which usually are open air bred. They eat branches of plants and trees, which also contain flowers, so their meat is well flavoured. They also move all the time so they do not have too fatty parts and their flesh is full of collagens.
I use goat very often. It is ridiculously cheap (7E per kilo the organic one !!!!!!!!, 9E per kilo the organic filets !!!!!!), as today´s consumers prefer eating steaks from imported, tasteless beef carrions. They are the same people who prefer Dubai than Venice, Lady Gaga than Amy Winehouse, Dwayne Johnson than Clint Eastwood etc. Better for me and for all good food lovers.
But let´s start our dish.
The day before we salt the goat and we keep it in the fridge. The day after we clean and pat it dry. We cut the meat in small pieces and we brown it in olive oil. The browning must be light, otherwise the meat will become too dry, we just want to add some Maillard aromas to the whole preparation. We add the onion, cut in dice and we continue for a while.
We deglaze with the wine, we add the stock and the saffron and we check the salt. We reduce the heat to minimum and we let the meat simmer for 2 hours.
Meanwhile, we clean well the mushrooms, we cut them in small pieces and we lightly sauté them in high heat. If we cannot find porcini or Caesar mushrooms, we can use any other kind of wild ones. We add them in the pot with the meat.
About 30 minutes before estimated cooking time, we add the tomatoes. There is absolutely no reason to add them at sooner, in fact we should avoid adding the sooner, because they will create an acid environment which will tighten the meat and provoke a further delay on its readiness. We check again the salt and we let simmer till the meat becomes very very tender, almost melted in the sauce (don´t worry, the mushrooms will not loose their shape). We also have to make sure that the stock is concentrated to a sauce, thus, if the meat is ready and the sauce is still runny, we remove the solid parts from the pot, we raise the heat and we reduce the sauce.
We remove from the heat and we add some ground black pepper.
Meanwhile in a big pot we bring salted water to a boil. When ready, we cook the paccheri for 2 minutes less than the al dente indicated time on the package.
We strain them and we transfer them in a big pan or wok with half of the sauce and some boiling water and we start to mantecare, which means continuously stirring the pasta and adding ladles of boiling water, till we create a creamy result. Paccheri is a difficult shape to mantecare, so don´t expect a perfect result, especially as, for taste purposes (parmigiano will cover mushrooms aromas), we don´t use parmigiano at this dish.
We put in plates, we add the other half of the sauce, the pieces of meat – mushrooms and fresh oregano and we serve.
