A rich, indulgent meal perfect for cosy family gatherings around the kitchen table. Thinly sliced potatoes make a good value substitute for lasagne sheets
Our Food Director Sarah is a food obsessive, and spends most of her time scoping out the latest food trends, experimenting in her own kitchen, or making her family wait to eat while she photographs every dinner she makes for the 'gram! A complete Middle Eastern food junkie, she is never far from a good shawarma marinade, a pinch of Aleppo chilli or a sprig of dill
See more of Sarah Akhurst ’s recipes
Sarah Akhurst
Our Food Director Sarah is a food obsessive, and spends most of her time scoping out the latest food trends, experimenting in her own kitchen, or making her family wait to eat while she photographs every dinner she makes for the 'gram! A complete Middle Eastern food junkie, she is never far from a good shawarma marinade, a pinch of Aleppo chilli or a sprig of dill
See more of Sarah Akhurst ’s recipes
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Ingredients
For the ragù
2 tbsp rapeseed oil
1 large onion, diced
2 carrots, diced
2 sticks celery, diced
3 garlic cloves, finely sliced
2 tsp fennel seeds
80g cubetti pancetta
1kg 20% fat pork mince
200ml white wine
300ml chicken stock
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 tsp clear honey
10g fresh sage, roughly chopped
For the béchamel
50g butter
50g plain flour
750ml milk
½ tsp ground nutmeg
75g Stilton, crumbled
75g Parmesan, grated
For the lasagne
100g kale
1kg potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced
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Step by step
For the ragù, heat the oil in a deep frying pan and fry the onion, carrots and celery for 8-10 minutes until soft. Add the garlic, fennel seeds and pancetta; fry for 3-4 minutes. Add the pork mince, breaking it up well. Fry for 4-5 minutes, or until browned all over. Add the wine, let it bubble and reduce then add the stock, balsamic, honey and sage. Simmer for 25-30 minutes, uncovered. Season and set aside.
For the béchamel, melt the butter in a large saucepan and mix in the flour to make a paste. Cook gently for a minute or so, stirring. Slowly add the milk, whisking as you pour to prevent lumps forming. Simmer until the sauce thickens. Mix in the nutmeg, Stilton and half the Parmesan, stirring until the cheese has melted. Season and set aside.
Preheat the oven to 200°C, fan 180°C, gas 6. Blanch the potato slices in a pan of boiling water for 3-4 minutes until just tender, then drain and set aside. Put the kale in a microwaveable bowl with a splash of water. Cover and cook for 90 seconds, until wilted, then drain.
To layer up the lasagne, put a third of the ragù in the base of a baking dish. Top with a third of the kale and then drizzle over some of the béchamel. Cover the surface with a layer of potatoes, then repeat the layers finishing with a layer of potatoes and then a final layer of béchamel. Sprinkle over the remaining Parmesan and bake for 1 hour, until golden and bubbling and the potatoes are tender. Cover the top with foil during cooking if it starts browning too much.
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Line the bottom of the baking pan with 4 cooked lasagna noodles, overlapping them. Spread the ricotta mixture first then the meat sauce on top. Sprinkle grated mozzarella and top with another three noodles. Repeat layering the ricotta and meat sauce with the cheese.
Adding egg to ricotta cheese helps to bind the cheese for lasagna so that it doesn't ooze out of the casserole when you cut it. Basically, the egg helps all the cheesy goodness stay intact. So what happens if you don't put eggs in your lasagna? It'll just be a bit runnier, but omitting the egg won't affect the taste.
A béchamel is rich, creamy, and better adheres the layers of pasta together. But some still firmly believe ricotta is the way to go. It's lighter in texture than a béchamel and can offset the richness of the meat sauce and mozzarella.
Cover the baking dish with aluminum foil. Bake in the preheated oven for 30 to 40 minutes. Remove the foil and bake until cheese is golden brown, 5 to 10 more minutes. Remove from the oven and let stand for 10 minutes before cutting and serving.
After the initial sauce layer, add a layer of pasta sheets, ricotta mixture (or bechamel), sauce, and cheese. Then repeat the layers. Top the last layer of your lasagna with sauce and cheese.
Let me break it to you: If you want to make a lasagna, three layers just won't cut it! For the perfect lasagna, you need at least 4-5 layers to really enjoy all those mouth-watering flavors. And, here's a pro-tip: make sure to season each layer generously, but not too much. The average lasagna has 8 layers!
Its ultra-creamy texture can range anywhere from thick to thin, depending on what you need it for. For example, I use a “medium” thick béchamel sauce for my lasagna. If it's too thick, the sauce will dry out and disappear during baking.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place the lasagna (without the container of sauce) in a small, ovenproof pan; Cover the lasagna with foil and place in the oven. Cook the lasagna for about 20 minutes until it reaches an internal temperature of 165 degrees (remove the foil if you wish to brown the top)
The number one reason lasagna turns out soupy is, quite simply, too much sauce. There is such a thing as too much of a good thing, and this is it. To avoid baked lasagna swimming in sauce, use enough sauce to cover each layer but don't go overboard. Wet ingredients are another reason lasagna turns watery.
It sounds unconventional to use milk in a meaty red sauce, but upon further investigation, it makes total sense why Italians swear by it. According to our Food Director Amira, not only does milk add a rich flavour to the bolognese, but it also “helps cut through the acidity of the tomatoes and red wine”.
You can prevent lasagna from becoming dry while baking it by undercooking the noodles, adding sauce or cheese sauce to the top layer, using a béchamel sauce or a creamy meat ragú, avoiding ricotta cheese or beating it with egg and herbs, and covering the lasagna with foil while baking it.
Roux-based sauces have a reputation for going lumpy but there are a few things that help to stop lumps forming. Adding hot liquid to a hot roux stops the butter from clumping and causing lumps. Adding the liquid gradually to start and mixing well between each addition.
Whole milk, which has a higher fat content, is often used in baking to add richness and flavor. It is also a good choice for creating a softer crumb in breads and cakes.
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