Slow Cooker Bolognese {No Browning Recipe!}

This Slow Cooker Bolognese recipe is so easy, with NO BROWNING browning necessary! Just leave it to cook all day and come home to a thick, rich beef ragu. Perfect to top spaghetti or use in lasagne.

Is there a more classic midweek dinner than Spag Bol?! 🍝

I’ve taken this family favourite dish and reinvented it to be cooked while you’re busy all day, totally hands off – no faffing. Meet my Slow Cooker Bolognese.

Yes, I mean it when I say we don’t have to fry off the mince to brown it beforehand, which means this is a true throw-it-all-in slow cooker recipe – AKA a trusty ‘dump bag’ dinner.

I love sharing my newly discovered slow cooker hacks with you, and this is the ULTIMATE time-saving method of making this much-loved dish.

I have made sure it’s packed with rich flavour and the long, slow cooking just enhances the depth of deliciousness. Did I mention how easy it is too?!

I hope you love it as much as we do. ❤️

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Why you’ll love this Slow Cooker Bolognese recipe

⭐️ Soft and tender beef

⭐️ Rich and delicious sauce

⭐️ Perfect for batch cooking and freezing

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How we came up with this recipe

It can sometimes be tricky to get the flavours right with slow cooker recipes, especially if we’re not browning the meat we’re using beforehand. And that’s even truer with beef. 

And so I knew if we were going to get spaghetti bolognese made in a slow cooker, it would have to be perfectly fine-tuned. The adapted version would also have to be worth cooking it differently for.

I am DELIGHTED to say that, after lots of testing, this bolognese recipe ticks all of the boxes…

✅ It’s rich in flavour thanks to a few extra ingredients that you might normally leave out (red wine, Worcestershire sauce, extra quantities of herbs and tomatoes, for example). 

✅ It’s also SO easy. Yes we really do just add all of the ingredients to the slow cooker, switch on and go. We don’t need to brown the mince at all. Which means preparing dinner takes just a few minutes, and the outcome is a rich, thick sauce that will go down with the whole family.

✅ It has a lovely consistency that is very ragu-like. If you give the mince a quick chop up before you add it into the pan, it won’t go into clumps at all.  

✅ You can then serve with spaghetti (make this separately as you’re about to eat), or it can even be used as a base for a lasagne or on top of a jacket potato.

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More slow cooker beef mince recipes

⭐️ Slow Cooker Chilli Con Carne ⭐️

⭐️ Homemade Doner Kebab ⭐️

⭐️ Slow Cooker Beef Enchiladas ⭐️

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Ingredients

• Beef mince (ground beef) – I like to use a 5% beef fat mince as it avoids excess fattiness in the sauce (as none will be cooking off). Any beef mince will work fine though.
• Tinned tomatoes
• Onion, celery and carrots – I use frozen Soffrito mix (onions, celery and carrots chopped into small cubes). Or you can prepare from scratch(see notes).
• Garlic – Fresh or jarred/frozen is OK.
• Tomato pureé – If you’re in USA/CAN: Tomato purée = tomato paste (the thick, concentrated kind in the small can).
• Red wine
• Beef stock cubes
• Dried oregano
• Bay leaves – Fresh or dried is fine (remove before serving)
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• Worcestershire sauce
• Fresh basil

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How to make Spaghetti Bolognese in a slow cooker

1. Put all of the slow cook ingredients into the slow cooker. Cook on HIGH for 6 hours or LOW for 8 hours. 
2. Add the Worcestershire sauce and fresh basil before serving.

Hint: If you want to serve this with spaghetti, boil the spaghetti for 2-3 minutes less than the usual cooking time. Drain and add to the bolognese sauce, with a splash or two of reserved cooking water. Stir well and allow the pasta to absorb the sauce a little and soften.

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Top tips

Prep the night before

You can save yourself even more time in the morning for this recipe and prepare the ingredients for your slow cooker THE EVENING BEFORE! 

Simply throw everything for the initial cook into the slow cooker, pop the lid on, then store it in the fridge overnight. In the morning, put it into the slow cooker and don’t forget to switch ‘on’.

Hack: Frozen mixed vegetables base

You can replace the individual carrots, celery and onion ingredients for a frozen bag of ‘soffritto’, which comes already pre-chopped and all together in one bag. (I love this cheat for lots of recipes!) It might be called ‘vegetable base mix’ or something similar in some supermarkets.

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