I tend to avoid onion in most pasta sauces as I feel it makes them a bit claggy. Ragu for Bolognese is different. In that case the cooking is so long and slow that the onions are completely assimilated. I wouldn't put garlic in there but Mrs Steve wants it, and it's caused furious rows. My compromise is to throw in a handful of bashed garlic cloves. That way, we get the sweetness of the garlic without the acrid harshness that the minced thing adds. I think that if garlic is ever the point of the thing, then it has to be the fresh young cloves of spring garlic that haven't even had time to grow a papery skin yet. I adore the whole garlic cloves in olive oil that come Marché style in jars. I can easily eat half a jar of those at a sitting. I say this to emphasise that I'm a garlicophile par excellence. But mincing garlic is akin to drinking dry white wine at room temp or decanting warm champagne until it's as flat as a witch's t*t. Philistinism personified.