Food with Passion perfect homemade Lasagne

John Paul Kennedy is a self-taught cook and an avid fan of collecting cookery books with a passion for good old-fashioned home cooking.

His passion for proper family cooking stems from his TWO Grandmothers, who were both excellent cooks, one of whom was a trained chef.

JP promises to bring us plenty of family-inspired recipes and tasty treats while showing us how to get the basics right.

I’ve used the same authentic Lasagne recipe for over a decade now but recently I’ve found myself scouring through my vast supply of cookbooks looking for new inspiration to already tried and tested family favourite recipes.

While flicking through my books last week I came across ‘Lasagne of Love’ by Nigella Lawson from her fabulous cook book ‘ Cook, Eat, Repeat’ and I remembered how frequently people posted about how good this recipe was on many of the foodie social media groups I follow.

I decided I would give it a go, so I studied the recipe and devised my own slightly adapted version; which I give you now.

I found with the recipe there was too much fluffing about with the bechamel sauce for example so I tweaked it slightly; a mixture of Nigella and my own tried and tested version plus; I didn’t layer it up the way Nigella does in her recipe; finishing with a layer of Ragu followed by cheese!

I stuck with tradition; final layer being pasta, bechamel sauce followed by cheese.

All I can say was this went down an absolute storm with my family and while yes, there are a few more stages to this recipe than a conventional lasagne, it is perfect for lazy weekends when you have more time to attend to recipes that involve a few stages albeit most of them repetitive!

Ingredients:  (Feeds 8 people)           

• 350g mince beef
• 350g mince pork
• 800g tomato passata
• 500ml of beef stock
• 2 carrots
• 2 onions
• 1 stick of celery
• Teaspoon of garlic powder
• 4 teaspoons of tomato puree
• 150g streaky bacon / rindless pancetta
• ½ teaspoon dried chilli flakes
• 200ml red wine
• 3 bay leaves
• 1 tablespoon freshly chopped thyme
• Small bunch of chopped flat leaf parsley
• 1 teaspoon of sea salt
• 2 teaspoons of freshly ground black pepper
• 3-4 tablespoons of olive oil
• 10- 12 lasagne pasta sheets (I don’t make my own, but fresh pasta sheets are great here)

Bechamel Sauce:

• 800ml milk
• 100g plain flour
• 100g unsalted butter
• ½ teaspoon nutmeg
• 3 teaspoons of tomato puree
• 3 tablespoons of grated parmesan

Topping:

• 1 full bag of grated mozzarella
• Generous grating of parmesan cheese all over
• Freshly ground black pepper

 

Method:

1. Finely chopped the onions or pop them into a food processor and add to a large heavy past pan with the oil and on a medium heat cook them for 15 minutes. I used a cast iron casserole pan.
2. Using the same processor add the carrots, celery, herbs, streaky bacon and garlic and pulse everything together but not too finely that it turns to mulch!
3. Heat your oven to 170 degrees / 150 Fan. Then scrape every piece of the mixture in on top of the onions and mix everything together and cook on high heat for 5 minutes then reduce the heat and cook for a another 5 minutes until. Then add in the chilli flakes and cook for another 5 minutes.
4. Add the wine, tomato puree, passata (or tins of chopped tomatoes), beef stock, bay leaves and seasoning and bring to a bubble for about 10 minutes.
5. Clamp down a lid and place into the pre-heated oven for an hour. Then start making the bechamel sauce.
6. Melt the butter over a moderate heat; add the flour and cook for two minutes whisking constantly to get rid of the taste of raw flour. Add the other ingredients to the milk in a large measuring jug and in three pouring’s add to the butter and flour mixture, whisking all the time to ensure the sauce has no lumps and until it is nice and thick.
7. You are now ready to start building the lasagne. I stuck to tradition with meat sauce, followed by pasta, then bechamel sauce; repeating until you have no meat sauce left. The finish with a final layer of pasta sheets, remaining bechamel sauce and adorn with the grated mozzarella and parmesan cheese. Cover in foil pop into a preheated oven at 180Degrees fan for 40 – 45 minutes. Remove the foil and leave to bake and brown for another 20 – 30 minutes, until it’s slightly scorched in parts and buddling! Leave to stand for 20 – 30 minutes before diving in and trying to cut into portions; it will adhere better and won’t fall apart on you once left to stand but will still be piping hot inside.

This freezes really well and is great for batch cooking.

You can get ahead and build the lasagne the day before. If doing so I would add another 15 minutes to the initial cooking time in the oven to allow it to cook through.

Serve with a simple side salad, home-made fries / potato wedges and listen to all the Emmmmmm and yummmmmm sound effects at the dinner table – then you know the little bit of effort was worth it!