Making a lasagne from scratch

It’s just practice. I can whip one up from scratch in no time. My husband is painfully slow. He is not confident with the bechamel so can’t double hand like me (I get the bolognese started, then cook the bechamel and deal with both together.) He is also worried about the bechamel getting lumpy so works with a much lower heat along with taking time measuring things I do by eye.

For him, I say make a large bolognese a couple of days before (it gets more flavour this way anyway). You can have this with jacket spuds, spaghetti, loaded fries.

Then you only have to concentrate on the bechamel on the day you make it and use what’s left of the bolognese.

It takes me about 3 hours to make a lasagne. I make enough béchamel to put a portion into the freezer, and use some of the ragu to go with pasta later in the week. I love cooking and can pretty much do it on auto pilot now, but I enjoy every step of the process.

I think, as with so many things, you can knock a version of lasagne together in 30 minutes - as several posters have mentioned - or do it the long way round. To me, you can absolutely taste the difference between the two, and I think every minute spent doing it is worth it.

Other people think the 30 minute version tastes good enough, and they would rather be doing other things than rolling out pasta, so that's fine.

I know Mary Berry is a national treasure but I find her recipes and a bit shit compared with the likes of Delia, Nigella grits teeth to say this Jamie etc. Personally if I want to make lasagne from scratch I plan way ahead and batch cook a massive bolognaise sauce to freeze in portions, some to have as spag bol and some to use in lasagne, means you don't have to do all the work in one go. Delia has an easy bechamel recipe where you whisk plain flour into cold milk, add a blob of butter then whisk over a lowish heat until thickened. And my secret weapon for smooth cheese sauce (if you're not aiming for 100% upf-free) is to chuck a processed cheese slice in along with the grated cheddar- you can't taste it but it stops the sauce from going grainy.

Similar to one I made recently… I’m going to add wine and some milk to meat sauce next time too and use better mince. I imagine it takes a while when you’re looking after young kids. It’s definitely not a bash together tea but shouldn’t take two hours - maybe an hour. It does also use loads of pans and stuff in the kitchen. I’ve bought M&S ready cooked soft lasagna sheets and also pre grated cheese 😅 … for me this really helped speed things up.
Hope it tastes nice @tangerinemagic ! X

I always make from scratch and the white sauce is the quickest bit! I usually make the ragu day before, I blitz all the veg in a processor, fry meat, add veg and the rest of the bits then into the slow cooker and let it cook until done enough.

Second day then it's make the white sauce which takes nothing like an hour, I don't know how that would happen! Then assembly which is my least favourite part as it's always a messy counter afterwards. I grate the cheese in processor too and when I make lasagna I make at least two large ones and freeze one. I often freeze enough grated cheese for next time too and at the moment there is a big container of ragu in freezer as well ready to make a couple of lasagnas on Monday, all I'll have to do is make the white sauce and assemble and bake.

Agree with others to make the sauce the day before - basically a less wet spaghetti Bol sauce. I freezes well at that stage too for spaghetti Bol or lasagna another time.

I make my cheese sauce using cornflour and butter and milk - less chance of lumps and no need to cook out the flour before adding the milk. That can also be made ahead and chilled.

when I assemble, I make 1 for today and at least 1 more for another day that I then freeze - it cooks fine from frozen. And I also make the first one a large one, as leftovers also freeze well once cooked, to be reheated another time.

Yes it’s a lot of work, but worth it - and even more as it’s far easier to increase the amounts to do 2-3 all at once rather than making. 2-3 individually over time.

I make a cheat's lasagne where instead of fannying around with a bechamel I mix mascarpone, cream and grated Parmesan. It's delicious and takes a fraction of the time.

The more you do it the quicker you get.
Microwave the milk to bring it up to temperature. It should take less than 10 mins and not an hour.

If I’m making a lasagne, I tend to make a bolognaise the evening before and double the quantity. I use the leftover bolognaise to make a lasagne the next day.

But, even if I do make lasagne from scratch in one day, it hasn’t ever taken me more than an hour.

I tend to make one whenever I’m making a batch of bolognaise. I think you were probably over-coddling the béchamel. I melt butter, saute the flour for a couple of minutes then add half the milk and bring to the boil on a high heat. That tends to given me a nice thick roux that I can beat any lumps out of, then add the rest of the milk (bit by bit, but in one go IYSWIM), and bring back to the boil stirring. Takes no more than ten mins for a large three layer lasagne.

And you definitely only need the Parmesan. Cheddar is an abomination 😜

Just buy a ready made one OP! @tangerinemagic

Life is too short!

I have been known to use Bisto white sauce granules. They really are very good and well seasoned. I mix them with boiling water from the kettle and then add a generous helping of double cream. Everyone says my bechamel is gorgeous. Reader - I don't disillusion them!

I make my lasagna from scratch .. BUT
I don’t bother with béchamel sauce. Use mozzarella and cheese between layers, it’s just as good ( if not better)
( ready to get abused by Italians on here - sorry guys!)
I add lots of veg too. It is the best thing ever

Forgot to say I just use the large field mushrooms now. Frozen onion and garlic are very handy to have in as well.

The secret for me is:

batch cook bolognaise frozen so that’s already done
cheat’s white sauce: mix of creme fraiche / soured cream / Greek yoghurt etc with S&P, Parmesan & nutmeg rather than bechamel

Suddenly it’s an assembly job rather than a cooking marathon

It shouldn't have taken you this long.

There's no difference in ingredients between pre grated or block parmesan/cheddar so get the pre grated and save some time there.

I've never thought of bechamel sauce as a time intensive job (it's like 5 mins?) so I'm not sure how you've managed to drag that out.

I still make a bunch at once and freeze because I don't like cooking after work. So I would recommend doing that next time, at least you'll feel like your hard work has given more of a return.

I love making lasagna but I would not have attempted it with a toddler around. And the fact that you went shopping right before means that the whole thing feels like it took a really long time.

Next time it will be faster as you have done it before. And make a double portion, freeze one. It's excellent make ahead meal.

For 750 ml of milk i would use 75g butter and 75g of flour. It still shoulnt take an hour. Generally adding milk slowly would be to add around 100 - 150 ml, whisk it in and repeat until milk used should only take 5 to 10 mins then a low simmer while stirring for a 5 mins to make sure the raw flour is cooked out. Add salt, white pepper and nutmeg and that's it.

Homemade from scratch is the only decent lasagna. We got a free Charlie Bigham it was gross, too sweet for me.

An hour on the bechemel sauce is hilarious. How can it take that long?

I remember doing some kind of quick-ish version something like the link below which was quite nice, although I appreciate not for everyone!

www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/classic-lasagne

Never never ever buy the sauce. It's so quick and easy to do.

My shortcut would be to use a frozen soffrito mix ( onion carrot celery) and make sure to drain off the excess liquid.

Best quality mince - never the lean kind and n3ver ever turkey. Venison works well too. But stronger flavour.

Red wine a bay leaf and a drop of milk in the mince mix a la Elizabeth David.

Should not take long. But better served the next day.

I bother making it because it tastes nicer. Don’t think I’ve ever spent that long making one though.

30 mins on average for me too. Bechamel cooks at same time as meat sauce. Super easy.

On the plus side If you do it with salad and garlic bread I can usually stretch it to do us for tea the next night as well. Have to hide it from DS if he's staying or he'll eat the lot.

That's the recipe I use. It's really easy and relatively speedy.