My old lasagne recipe is, to be honest, far too rich. Lasagne is probably my favourite dish in the world, always has been since I was a kid, and it is the dish I have cooked more times than any other (except maybe for bacon sandwiches).
Since writing the recipe on here, I have tweaked it quite a bit, and I think, pretty much perfected it now.
The old recipe uses a lot of wine, and spends a very long time in the oven. This makes a lovely rich bolognaise but then, with the addition of the cheese and milk, it gets a bit too much.
So here it is, updated:
Ingredients, for the bolognaise
- A “pod” of mince from William Rose
- An onion
- 4 cloves of garlic
- 1 small tin of tomato purée
- 1 pack, or tin, of chopped tomatoes
- A glass of nice red wine
- 3 bay leaves
- Dried oregano
For the white sauce:
- 50G Butter
- Pint of full cream milk
- Plain flour
- Nutmeg
- Cheddar cheese (I know, not very authentic, but who cares)
Heat up some olive oil in a large casserole dish (le crusset if you can justify spending £100 on a dish, which I can, as I use it every day). Chop up the onion and throw it in. Let it gently cook until nicely soft. Mince up the garlic and throw that in along with some salt and pepper and cook for a further minute. Turn off the heat, remove the onion/garlic mixture from the dish and set aside. A dash more oil, heat back up high and in goes the mince. Cook until nicely browned all over, then scoop the tomato puree in and give it a good stir so all the meat is coated. Next in goes the chopped tomatoes, the bay, and the onion/garlic mixture, oregano and the wine. Mix well, season and add some water to get quite a loose consistency, but not too watery. This needs to gently simmer on the hob for half an hour or so, at which point you can turn off the heat and let it cool down a bit.
The white sauce. Put the butter in a pan on a gentle heat (a medium to large saucepan) and let it melt. Now add the flour (yes we are making a roux) bit by bit. I keep a tea strainer in the flour container, and sieve the flour in. I don’t know how much you need, but I usually use about a tea strainer and a half. Add it gradually and mix with a wooden spoon. Eventually all the moisture will be soaked up into the flour and you will be left with a sticky lump in the pan. Let that cook off for a few minutes, and then start adding in the milk. Again, just a bit a time, letting the flour/butter mixture absorb the milk before adding more. You might not need the whole pint of milk. Once it is all added, let that cook for a while - it will thicken as you do. You are aiming for a reasonably thick sauce, but still quite loose - it will thicken up more when you add the cheese. If it is lumpy, you can either use a whisk to try and break it down a bit, or use a large sieve to get the lumps out. Season, and grate some nutmeg in, not too much though. Now for the cheese. Two handfuls is about as accurate as I can be as I have never weighed or measured anything. Let it melt, and keep it on a very low heat, stirring occasionally.
Now the construction. Take your dish, something quite large and ceramic. Grease it well with butter, then add a layer of bolognaise. I keep it quite thin, you need to cover the bottom of the dish completely but not too deep. Now arrange your lasagne sheets over the bolognaise to cover, filling in any gaps with broken bits (never overlap). Pour over some of the sauce and spread it out evenly with the back of a spoon. Again, not too thick but enough to cover the pasta. Repeat this process until the dish is full, finishing with a layer of the white sauce. I generally manage to get 4 layers of pasta in. Microplane some parmesan over the top to give a nice crunchy crust and chuck it in the oven, medium heat for 30 to 45 minutes, or until the top is crisp (but not black) and the pasta is cooked through.