Classic Lasagne

Updated at: Wed, 16 Aug 2023 20:17:33 GMT

Step 1

Assemble all of your ingredients, preparation is key

Step 2

First we will make the meat sauce or ragu, so we need to prep all of our veggies

Step 3

Finely dice the onion, celery and carrot, mince or dice the garlic

Step 4

In a large pan, cast iron pot or large, heavy bottom sauce pan heat a good amount of olive oil, enough to cover the pan on a medium to high heat

Step 5

Add the carrot, celery, onion and cook. Many recipes call for you to 'sweat' the veggies, I tend to cook until soft and just starting to colour the veggies

Step 6

Add the garlic and stir through, cooking for 1 minute or until fragrant

Step 7

Push the vegetables to one side of the pan to create space, add a small amount of olive oil to the cleared side of the pan if the pan is dry and add the beef mince

Step 8

Spread out the beef mince so that it covers the pan, at this stage I usually spread the beef out and just spoon the vegetables ontop of the mince so the mince can colour on the pan and the veggies don't char

Step 9

Leave the beef mince to colour for a couple of minutes, this will depend on the size of your pan and the heat of your stove. Once the beef mince is starting to colour, stir occasionally incorporating all the vegetables into the beef mix until all the beef is cooked. You should be able to tell by the change in colour.

Step 10

Now, most recipes will cook the beef, but we want to take it a step further, we want some colour on the beef mince. Keep cooking the mince until the mince starts to get Crispy darker parts, stirring occasionally you want to cook off all the water and liquid in the pan so the beef can get a darker brown, but not burnt. It's important to keep an eye on the mix at this point to make sure It doesn't burn.

Step 11

Now, add the tomato paste, stirring to fully incorporate into your meat sauce and fry until fragrant 1-2 minutes.

Step 12

Once fragrant, add the passata, about 500ml and maybe 1/4 of water if needed

Step 13

Reduce the heat to medium to low for a slow simmer and let your ragu/meat sauce reduce slightly. We want a thick sauce, but not completely dried out.

Step 14

Now onto the beschamel. Follow a beschamel recipe if you have a good one, otherwise I find this recipe works well:

Step 15

Melt 50g of butter in a saucepan over a medium heat until bubbling gently.

Step 16

Add 50g of flour and stir with a whisk until fully incorporated.

Step 17

We want to cook off the flour taste for approx 1-2 minutes, stirring regularly until a paste forms.

Step 18

The trick to getting no lumps is to heat up your milk, and the trick to a creamy beschamel is full cream milk

Step 19

Warm your milk and then add about 1/4 of the milk at a time, whisking constantly as you do. I typically add 1/4 of the milk, whisk until no lumps, then the next 1/4 and so on, progressing as I whisk out any lumps

Step 20

The consistency of your beschamel depends on how much milk you add, I like a beschamel that is fairly thick, but you do you.

Step 21

Once all the milk is combined, I typically salt and pepper by beschamel and add a handful of our Mozzarella, maybe 50g worth and melt it through for a cheese sauce.

Step 22

Now we can assemble! Take your ragu and beschamel off the heat, set your oven to 180-200 degrees Celsius for fan-forced and grab a large baking dish. I like the pyrex ones but use whatever you have

Step 23

Spread out a layer of meat sauce on the bottom of the pyrex dish, then layer the lasagne sheets, then a layer of meat sauce, a layer of beschamel, a layer of pasta sheets then repeat until dish is full or all your sauce is used up- meat - beschamel - pasta sheet

Step 24

Add beschamel to the top of your lasagne and then cover with the remaining Mozzarella. Add as much Mozzarella as you like, you can add parmesan cheese as well if you like.

Step 25

Put your lasagne in the oven uncovered for about 20 minutes, no hard rules here, you want all the cheese to melt and brown and usually this will be enough to cook the pasta well if you set the oven temp as directed.

Step 26

Pull it out when you are happy with the colour, let it rest for about 5 minutes or so and slice to serve. Enjoy! Given how simple this lasagne is, you'd be surprised how rich and deeply flavoured it is. We didn't add anything special here, we didn't even salt the ragu, just the beschamel, but trust me you can salt after you serve if you need to. The key to the depth of flavour is how we brown the mince, its a bit like charring a steak vs a steak cooked on a low heat. Big difference in flavour.

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