Best, Fast, Easy- Lasagna
History
Thoughts
Lasagna used to be the shot I called on my birthday. I loved and I’m sure I would still love my mom’s lasagna. She made a midwesternized version with jarred sauce, browned ground beef and cottage cheese. I like to make everything myself. That said, take whatever bits you like and leave the ones you don’t. Lasagna is labor intensive and often pricey but worth it, soo worth it.
Once you have the red sauce, meat, cheese sauce and a pot of boiling water. It is time to build your lasagna. I usually do 7 layers of pasta and 5 layers of the filling. You may have to adjust to your casserole dish. If you have left over sauces, use them however you see fit. I use no boil noodles, but I boil them briefly anyway. You see, I made a dry lasagna. It was fine, but I was bummed. To avoid that, I give the noodle sheets a quick dunk to get them started. This hydrates them slightly but also warms them up. If you are making this recipe in 1 go, everything else is still hot. Adding this heat means your lasagna bakes faster. Which is good because you worked for this baby.
# Leftovers freeze great. Leave uneaten portions uncut. Wrap tightly in heavy duty foil. Then wrap that in cling wrap. When reheating, use an oversized casserole dish, add a small amount of water to the space around the Lasagna, cover in tin foil and bake in a 350 degree oven until how and melty. It usually take at least an hour.
Ingredients
2 boxes rectangular no bake noodles
1 batch of slow red sauce or 2 quarts other
2 cups shredded low-moisture mozzarella
1 Large pot of boiling water
Meat Sauce
1 Lb ground beef
2 tbs olive oil
2 carrots
2 celery stalks
1 medium onion
4 garlic cloves
1 dash worcester sauce
¼ tsp soy sauce
Salt and pepper
Ricotta bechamel
4 tbs butter
4 tbs ap flour
2 cups milk
1 container ricotta
5 basil leaves
1 cup shredded parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper
Meat sauce instructions
Rough chop carrots, celery, onion and garlic and add to food processor. Pulse 3-5 times or until most pieces are the size of bb.
Add oil to pan and turn heat to medium.
Add veggie mixture, worcester, and soy sauce to pan and and cook until thick and most of the most of the moisture has evaporated. The soy and worcester are background flavors. You really don’t want to know that you are tasting them. They are full of umami and make it seem like you cooked it all day.
Reduce heat to low.
Add beef and break meat up while combining with the veggie mixture.
Stir beef and veggie mixture until the meat is broken down to a smooth texture.
Raise heat to medium.
Add salt and pepper
Allow meat and veggie mixture to fry for 5 minutes.
Ricotta Bechamel Instructions
Melt butter over medium low heat in a sauce pan
Warm milk in microwave for 1 minute
Whisk in flour to butter by scattering it bit by bit over the surface of the melted butter. Adding the flour this way reduces likelihood of clumps.
Whisk continuously for 1 minute and then frequently until it turns just slightly brown and begins to smell toasty.
Slow whisk in the warm milk
Continue to whisk to thicken for a minute or 2
Add basil leaves
Add the ricotta one spoonful at a time until all the lumps are gone
Continue to whisk and add parmesan cheese, salt and pepper
Stir until combined and melted.
Remove from heat and set aside.
You now have red sauce, meat, cheese sauce and a pot of boiling water. It is time to build your lasagna. I usually do 7 layers of pasta and 5 layers of the filling. You may have to adjust to your casserole dish. If you have left over sauces, use them however you see fit. I use no boil noodles, but I boil them briefly anyway. You see, I made a dry lasagna. It was fine, but I was bummed. To avoid that, I give the noodle sheets a quick dunk to get them started. This hydrates them slightly but also warms them up. If you are making this recipe in 1 go, everything else is still hot. Adding this heat means your lasagna bakes faster. Which is good because you worked for this baby.
Building the Lasagna
Pre-heat the oven to 350
Get out your largest casserole dish. Mine is like 9X16 so pretty big.
Add 6 noodle sheets to the boiling water 1 at and give each a quick stir.
Put 3 ladles’ of red sauce in the bottom of the casserole dish and cot the bottom.
Remove the slightly pliable noodle sheets and lay them in a single layer over the sauce. They may stick together, separate them.
Evenly spread ⅓ of the meat mixture over the noodles. My advice is to put a dollop on each of the noodle sheets and use the back of a spoon or a spatula to smear it around.
Add 6 more noodle sheets to the water
Spread a ladle of red sauce over the meat to help fill in gaps.
Remove the noodles and create another noodle layer.
Ladle ½ the ricotta bechamel over the noodles ad spread evenly.
Spread a ladle of red sauce over the meat to help fill in gaps.
Repeat steps 5-11 until your dish is full or you run out of ingredients. The amounts I suggested will give you 7 layers of noodle, 3 layers of meat and 2 layers of cheese sauce. Reserve a few spoonfuls of cheese sauce for the top.
Add the final layer of parboiled noodles. Cover all of the exposed filling below. This may mean you have to break a few noodle sheets to custom fit the gaps.
Ladle enough sauce over the to create a final layer of sauce over the top. This sauce will condense so be generous. You may want to to reserve some of the tomato sauce for serving.
Cover the sauce with shredded cheese.
Cover the casserole dish tightly in tin foil and place in preheated 350 degree oven.
Bake for 40-45 minutes. Or until the sauce is bubbling all around.
Remove foil and bake another 10 minutes until chees begins to bubble and browns slightly.
Remove from the oven and let rest at least ½ hour. This is the hardest part but it allows everything to set-up and cool a bit.