Lasagne – Tasty as.

Lasagne is an easy dish to cook and prepare, it is however time consuming and can potentially be messy.

If you are used to preparing bolognase sauce you should be able to transfer these skills into mad lasagne skills very easily. (Less reduction of the sauce).

Very basic – and easy:

You Need:

• 500gram low fat non preservative mince
• Two cans of tomato’s diced
• One jar of bolognase sauce (5 brothers, dolmio, etal) (500-700grams)
• One bottle of tomato puree not concentrate
• Some lasagne sheets (i used san~remo)

Cook the mince – (you may like to add herbs, garlic, chilli at this point even an onion – if you wish to use your own herb flavourings use a second bottle of tomato puree and leave out the commercial bolognase sauce). Once the mince is cooked add all the tomato sauces, cans of tomato and bottle of puree bring to the boil. You need to reduce it slightly, but it still should remain runnier than a bolognase sauce – the lasagne sheets need to absorb this moisture and you dont want to dry out your final product by over reduction at this point. Once you have the consitancy correct (it may take several lasagne attempts to work out the perfect consitancy – the required constistancy also depends on shape and depth of cooking tray and oven style).

Use a cup to pour 3-4mm of sauce mixture at the bottom of a tray with deep sides (i use corningware with 3″ sides) cover with lasagne sheets, repeat to a minimum of 4 sheets – and a maximum of 8 in a criss cross pattern with sauce between each. The top layer should have sauce placed on it and then covered with cheeze. (I use the pre-grated mozarella, parmasan and cheddar mix called “Pizza Perfection”, but mozarella with a little parmasan is fine) cover with alfoil and bake at 180C for 35-45 minutes. Remove alfoil, reduce temp to 150 and cook for a further 5-10 minutes (depending on how runny the lasagne is at this point – there still should be some moisture). Remove from oven and leave to stand for 5 minutes. (This allows it to cook to edible temperatures and absorb any remaning moisture before serving.). Serve with crusty bread, a fresh garden salad and a nice red wine.

For alternative toppings you could add: any combination shaved and chopped strips of ham, tomato, diced bacon between the cheeze within the top sauce layer – it adds a little something extra every now and then.

M