Smokey bacon spaghetti bolognese

I have cooked a lot of spaghetti bolognese over the years and I was pretty much making this one up as I went along, but it worked out great. I put plenty of smoked bacon in there at the start and that was the main flavour along with the beef. After the recent snow and ice the thyme was looking a bit forlorn in the back garden, but I put a big bunch of that in as well.

Heat a good glug of olive oil in a thick based pot. Cut the rinds off each of the 3 rashers of back bacon in a single piece. Throw these rinds into the pot and let them start frying while you chop the rest of the bacon into small pieces. Add the rest of the bacon along with 2 chopped onions. Let the whole lot fry for about 10 minutes. Then add a finely chopped carrot and 2 sticks of celery.
Next add a kilogram of good quality beef mince. This needs to be good stuff. Use cheap mince and the dish will have a greasy flavour. Break the mince up with a wooden spoon and brown it through. Next add plenty of thyme on the twigs. Give it a rinse first, but don't bother chopping it. You will just fish that out of the sauce before serving.
Add 2 tins of plum tomatoes and stir to break them up a bit. About 2 tablespoons of tomato puree goes in next. Give the whole lot a good stir and simmer on a low heat for about 40 minutes. Check that the carrots and celery are cooked through. Fish out the bacon rinds and the thyme. The sauce is now ready, but you can leave it on a low heat while you cook the pasta. I did not add any extra salt to this and just seasoned with some black pepper. when the sauce was ready I took out a couple of portions for baby dinners and then added about a small glass of red wine.

Cook your spaghetti in plenty of salted water. I used wholewheat as I think it tastes better.

Finally grate plenty of parmesan cheese on top of the sauce in the serving dishes.