Share your lasagne please

[ODFOx]

I always make it big and deep. I have 3 different fillings between the layers (some duplicated) with bechamel just on the top.

How do you make yours?

For my tomato meaty sauce, I fry off beef mince, onions celery and carrot. I put them in the slow cooker with passata, tin of tomatoes, mixed herbs, garlic, Worcestershire sauce, prosciutto, mushrooms, red pepper, sugar, black pepper, bay leaves and tomato purée. I wouldn’t necessarily add all these vegetables usually, but lasagne is a great opportunity to hide vegetables for my children.

My bechamel has mature cheddar and mustard added to it.

I add bechamel to all the layers. On top of the last lasagne sheets, I put bechamel sauce, cheddar, mozzarella and Parmesan.

My lasagne is delicious, but I’m always after tips to improve further.

I should add that I layer up the lasagne in a big oven dish and bake it in the oven. The slow cooker is used to make my life a bit easier.

This is tonight's with 6 portions missing.
Ragu in the bottom with a sprinkle of cheddar
Pasta
Roasted veg with tinned tomato, garlic and basil
Pasta
Sliced tomatoes with basil leaves
Pasta
Ragu with a sprinkle of cheddar
Spinach leaves with a sprinkle of salt, pepper and nutmeg
Pasta
Spinach leaves with salt, pepper and nutmeg
Bechamel
Sprinkle of Parmesan.

I sometimes have a layer of mushrooms fried In garlic butter and mixed with cottage cheese and black pepper, but not tonight.

Im looking for inspiration to mix it up a bit more please. How do you make yours?

Before I layer my dry lasagne sheets I place them in a tray of boiling water for a few seconds then layer them.

Béchamel between each layer and masses of grated mozzarella on final top.

My spag sauce is the usual with added grated courgettes and oven roasted tomatoes.

@Appleseesaw

For my tomato meaty sauce, I fry off beef mince, onions celery and carrot. I put them in the slow cooker with passata, tin of tomatoes, mixed herbs, garlic, Worcestershire sauce, prosciutto, mushrooms, red pepper, sugar, black pepper, bay leaves and tomato purée. I wouldn’t necessarily add all these vegetables usually, but lasagne is a great opportunity to hide vegetables for my children.

My bechamel has mature cheddar and mustard added to it.

I add bechamel to all the layers. On top of the last lasagne sheets, I put bechamel sauce, cheddar, mozzarella and Parmesan.

My lasagne is delicious, but I’m always after tips to improve further.

Your sauce recipe sounds lovely! I've seen ads with Lea and Perrins in bolognese but never tried it. Does it give a piquancy and bring out the tomatoes? I must try that.

Grated courgette sounds good. Does it make that much of a different roasting the tomatoes first?

@Bunce1 Does roasting the tomatoes concentrate the flavour or just drive off some of the liquid?

ODFOx- I’m not really sure what it does to the sauce. It adds a certain flavour. I just splash in a bit, not too much. I think it gives a bit of oomph to the sauce. I highly recommend trying it. I like the sound of your basil and spinach ingredients. Think I’ll have to try that!

I cook my mincemeat in the slow cooker (game changer). I saute garlic, shallots or onion, carrot and celery. I add herbs, passata, Worcestershire sauce, oxo cube then I add the mince.
Three layers of mince, bechemal and lasagne sheets topped with fresh parmesan or similar. I cover with foil and bake for a good hour. Delicious.

A bit off piste, but I have been making a veggie lasagne, using pesto instead of a tomato ragu. I use leeks, asparagus, spinach, and peppers mixed with pesto, but you could use whatever you fancy. Assemble as normal with pasta/benchmark, although I tend to add cheese on each pasta sheet as well as on top.

Onions, grated carrot, sweated. Mince browned, dried herbs added, oxo cube and Worcestershire sauce added. Red wine added. Tinned chopped tomatoes added. A teaspoon of sugar and a dash of full fat milk added. Seasoned. Cooked low for as long as possible. Bechamel sauce. NO cheese in it. A little bit of the meat sauce at the bottom of the dish. Layer of dried lasagne. Layer of meat sauce. Layer of lasagne. Layer of meat sauce. Repeat until sauce is used up. Top layer of lasagne. Smother in Bechamel sauce. Then grated cheese on top. Whack in the oven on 170 for about 45 mins. Done. Even better reheated the next day.

I cook mine uncovered.

6 high quality pork sausages, casing removed and chopped into pieces.
250g low fat beef mince
Baby spinach
1 courgette
1 tube tomato puree
350g passata
2 tins chopped tomatoes
Dried lasagne pasta sheets
Garlic
1 onion
Basil
Splash red wine
Bit of beef stock
1 egg
2 pots ricotta
Parmesan cheese
1 pack of fresh mozarella
Herbs eg basil

1.Brown the onions in frying pan

1. Brown the mince and chopped sausage

3.Drain any fat and return meat and onion to pan 4.Add in puree, chopped and passata 5.Add garlic, red wine, beef stock and herbs

1. Add in diced courgette and spinach
2. Simmer all of this on low for an hour stirring occasionally
3. Turn off hob and put a layer of this in square oven dish, cover with pasta sheets.
4. Mix ricotta with egg and cover the pasta sheets with half the mixture.

10.Sprinkle parmesan 11. Put thin slices of mozarella on top of the parmesan. 12. Repeat all layers. 13. Cook until mozarella golden.

It's yummy and healthier for swapping out some of the meat for veg

I think roasting the tomatoes gives a more tomatoey taste and tbh I don’t think the courgette adds anything except one more veg to the daily veg count!

Lasagne is very calorific so we don’t have it that often but it is yummy!

Nigellas Lasagne of Love - it's a game changer. Worth the time and washing up. Will never deviate from it now it's been discovered.

Half beef and half pork mince. Ancient recipe from Carrier's kitchen

Fry off celery, onions and carrots then fry off garlic

Fry beef and pork mince until cooked add passata and 2 tbsp of tomato purée, turn heat right down and let it simmer for a good couple of hours, checking to make sure it doesn't dry out too much.

Make a béchamel sauce and stir in Parmesan cheese

Put a thin layer of Ragu into a dish then lay pasta sheets over the top, top with more ragu and a layer of béchamel sauce. Then add the next layer of pasta the opposite way so one lot vertical one lot horizontal and just repeat until everything is used up. By layering the pasta sheets in opposite directions per layer it helps it keep its shape when slicing as well. Then i top it off with more Parmesan cheese and grated mozzarella and pop it in the oven for 45 mins

I do a veggie one. I get the magimix out and use the Fine grating attachment for carrots and courgette, and the thicker one for onion and aubergine. The key is to summer these veg slowly in a wide pan to get caramelisation. Then proceed as usual with tomato sauce from 2 tins of tomato ( make a kind of marinara) and bechamel . I sometimes add mushrooms and frozen spinach too. Nice with a green salad and green Tabasco as an extra flavouring at the table.

I recently stirred boursin into my cheese sauce because it needed using up and it was absolutely delicious

I just find the most important thing is slow-cooking the ragu tbh.

As an aside, I'm beginning to realise that whoever said on here the other day that it's virtually impossible to have a thread about food/recipes on MN without people going on about calories was correct.