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Best Ragù in Chicago
“A meat sauce documented by Italy's culinary academy, with regional variations from Bologna to Veneto—each with its own story.”
What the real thing tastes like
In Italian cuisine, ragù (Italian: [raˈɡu]; from French ragoût) is a meat sauce commonly served with pasta. An Italian gastronomic society, Accademia Italiana della Cucina, has documented several ragù recipes. The recipes' common characteristics are the presence of meat and the fact that all are sauces for pasta. The most typical is ragù alla bolognese (Bolognese sauce). Other types include ragù alla napoletana (Neapolitan ragù), ragù di salsiccia, ragù alla barese (ragù from Bari, sometimes made with horse meat), and ragù d'anatra (a traditionally tomatoless duck ragù, from Veneto).
0 voices, one story
Ragù is the Italian answer to a question every home cook asks: how do you make pasta sing? It's a meat sauce—sometimes pork, sometimes duck, sometimes horse—that has been documented and debated by Italy's Accademia Italiana della Cucina with the seriousness it deserves. The most famous is ragù alla bolognese, but the regional variations tell the real story: Neapolitan versions, a tomatoless duck ragù from Veneto, versions from Bari that challenge assumptions about what belongs in the pot. Each one shares the same mission: slow meat, deep flavor, pasta salvation.
Order it here when it has
- officially documented recipes
- diverse regional interpretations
- meat-forward complexity
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