Making a lasagne from scratch

Also if it's your first time, you'll get faster! It takes much longer if you are constantly checking the book and having to actually think about stuff.

My recipe (serves 6)
large onion finely chopped
2 medium carrots finely chopped
2 sticks celery finely chopped

saute in a pan with a little olive oil and pinch of salt for 15-20 minutes.

3 large cloves garlic finely chopped

add to the veg
add 2 cans chopped tomatoes
1 heaped teaspoon oregano
salt and black pepper
1 bay leaf
bring to boil and reduce to simmer.

cut a mozzarella ball into 6
grate 150g cheddar or other hard cheese
chop 30g flat leaf parsley

fry 500g mince in a separate pan, 20% fat mixed pork and beef tastes good but lower fat is fine
Add the sauce and simmer for another 20 minutes. Make the bechemel

1tbsp flour
1 ounce butter (or sunflower oil works well)
mix on low heat the gradually add 500ml milk, add 50g of the cheese, teaspoon oregano and half the parsley.

add the remaining parsley to the mince, layer up the lasagna top with Bechemel, the mozzarella and sprinkle with cheese.

im not a chef but i have sold this commercially at events (i have a vegetarian version too plus made a vegan version which the vegans loved but i didn’t like the weird taste of fake cheese!)

I should preface this by saying I'm an impatient person and not a particularly good cook!

I agree in principle, OP. I think its because I can make a dinner of spaghetti bolognese in 20 mins that's perfectly edible and yet to have lasagne, it feels like you go over and above this for a dinner that in theory would already be fine as just the bolognese (if that makes sense). It is a bit nicer IMO, but is it worth it...I'm not sure.

I make macaroni cheese a lot so I can make a basic white sauce in about 5 minutes. I wouldn't bother using two types of cheese. I use a tin of tomatoes and throw some herbs in. Assembly is just a rough guess at quantities of each layer.

I can imagine that a lasagne where the mince has been slowly cooking for hours etc and a complicated white sauce recipe would be absolutely lovely, but it's not something that I would do currently. Same principle applies again as above really...is a beautiful lasagne worth the effort over a reasonable one! (ETA some would say yes, some would say no..it's not a black and white right or wrong).

Having had a few disasters making lasagne when I was younger I still feel proud of myself when I make one now 🤣 It's definitely a weekend dinner though as it does take ages to make. I hope you enjoy it.

It wouldn't take that long but it is a time investment. I'm never sure it's worth the payback; it's not quite nice enough. But still nice!

Are you lining up the tasks efficiently? I make the bechemal while the ragu simmers. And you can be clearing up etc while you give the thickening bechemal the odd stir.

The other option is to have a white sauce made from crème fraîche/cream and cheese etc. That just needs whisking in a bowl. I do that for spinach and ricotta, look at Jamie Oliver.

Also make a massive batch and freeze - it's a recipe that pays back batch cooking very well.

2 1/2 hours? 😳 Usually knock 1 up in 45 minutes -an hour. You not got a pan blender? Saves time rather than standing there for ages stirring.

A quicker way of doing bechamel sauce is to mix some cornflour with a bit of water and add that to the milk. If you have a good cheddar to add to it it doesn't taste any different to done with butter.

Homemade tastes a million times better than dolmio or ready meal, but it does take a surprising amount of time, and I cook loads.

I think that the secret to doing it quickly is to make bolognaise one week, make double the quantity and freeze. Make lasagna the next week using the frozen bolognaise.

Bechemal is just practice - it gets quicker as you get more used to doing it. Add some nutmeg at the end - divine!

I use low fat natural yogurt mixed with cheese instead of the Bechemel. So much simpler and really tasty.

Try reading all the OP's posts before you jump in with a snippy comment. She has two very young children and she's not made it before.

I love making lasagne. It does take (me) ages, but I like to make one when I have time and peace, music on, bit of chopping and stirring, it's a lovely way to spend some time. I love to cook but hate the 'rustle up dinner after a day at work's type cooking, so to have the time to do some 'proper' cooking is a happy couple of hours. I did not attempt such things while child wrangling (when DC was young) and with a time constraint.

How ?

Chop onions , grate / chop garlic . Cook off with mince . Cook tomatoes until dark and almost syrupy . Chop herbs & add . Plus any veg you use ( celery , carrot ) , make a tomato sauce from it Combine with mince / onion mix . Cook long and slow at least an hour . Make Bechamel sauce , grate cheese , + a few stages I've probably missed out.
Layer up , put cheese on top , bake . I'd say that's a good few hours .

I tend to make a lasagna- by making double batches of Bolognese and then making a Mac n cheese for the following night- with at least double the sauce and then make the lasagna with leftovers. We normally have several in the freezer for lazy teas.....

Same

What the heck have you been doing to take an hour to make the sauce. You’ve clearly been dawdling or doing other stuff too. There’s no way it would take someone over two hours to make a lasagne from scratch. I don’t believe it.

Life is to bloody short to make Lasagne from scratch.

I can't see the issue with a Dolmio one every now again everything in moderation

The bechamel shouldn't take long, but a decent bolognaise takes a few hours. I basically never make lasagne, unless I make an enormous pot of bolognaise and have some left over.

It takes about that long when I make it but that's because I simmer the meat sauce for a couple of hours. The bechamel sauce is easy, I do infuse the milk first for an hour but the actual making and stirring bit
takes minutes!

It does take a while but I don't think it's a huge effort. I make the ragu early in the afternoon and leave it to simmer gently for a couple of hours. Bechemel shouldn't take an hour, I don't know what you were doing! Maybe the heat was too low? It usually takes me about 20 mins. Then a quick assembly job, grated cheese on top, scatter with halved cherry tomatoes and some dried Italian herbs and into the oven for 45 mins or so.

I do the bolognese all day in the slow cooker then the bechamel takes 5 minutes. 10 minutes tops assembling and done.

It’s so labour intensive to make the sauces from scratch. I usually make the bechamel the night before and then I often use a jar of tomato sauce. I don’t like jarred bechamel sauce but there are some nice and minimally processed tomato sauces out there. I find using a whisk makes the bechamel easier, no lumps, it takes me about 20 mins to make it.

Make mine from scratch but use crème fraiche with parmesan grated in rather than bechemel. Make vast quantities of the bolognese and then freeze it. V quick to make then. Cooking anything with toddlers around makes everything take 10 times longer tho ..,.

That all sounds pretty stressful OP. Cooking with toddlers and babies around is a nightmare.

For what it’s worth, I always use the Jamie Oliver lasagne recipe from Jamie’s Dinners, and love the hack of using crème fraiche (slightly thinned down with a splash of milk) instead of bechamel.

I know it’s not traditional but I use a fresh supermarket cheese sauce for my lasagnes - never managed to consistently make a good cheese sauce ( kids insist on cheese not bechamel) - I’ve tried all the tricks as my best friend was married to a chef for years