My daughter and I make lasagna together once a year (Christmas) and we use this cheater pan
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If you have a shop around you that sells fresh pasta sheets, get them. They are so easy and taste so much better!
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I’m not a fan of no-boil noodles, and I hate the hassle of boiling the regular ones. I picked up a great hint from Deb Perelman’s Smitten Kitchen lasagna recipe. She just pours boiling water over uncooked noodles and lets them sit for 5-10 minutes before using. I put mine in a separate pan, set it up as part of my assembly, and it works like a charm. So much easier.
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There is a large Italian store near me that has three restaurants in it, plus a bakery, pastry shop, meat market, wine market, wine bar, and grocery store. I thought about that today and wondered if they had fresh pasta sheets. I’ll check in there tomorrow. I’m going there anyway to order a light Italian dessert.
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I just use regular lasagne noodles, don’t buy Special No-bake ones. I started doing it the night before all the time because it just sets so nicely when I cut it to serve. No runniest or too soft and falls.
I also started making extra meat sauce if people wanted more.
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I find when I assemble, refrigerate, and then bake later it is more firm when served. I nearly always make it ahead and stick it in the fridge.
I love this idea and will do it next time for sure!
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We almost always do zucchini, too. Family loves it. We also use ground turkey. The whole thing is healthier that way. But for company it’s the real thing.
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Is there anything you do differently when using fresh pasta sheets? Adjustments on cooking time or anything?
I cook ahead other than the very top layer of shredded Italian cheese which I add on the final cook to get that gooey topping. I think flavors more developed in second bake.
I use uncooked pasta when layering. My roommate from bachelor pad days always had me add “bonus” pepperoni in each layer. If you want healthy, we will also include raw spinach in the layering process. That does create liquid but you feel less guilty eating all those carbs and fats.
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So what style do people do: Béchamel (northern style) or Ricotta and Mozzarella (southern style).
We always do it with ricotta and mozz, nobody in my Italian family has ever used the word Béchamel (same for my husband’s Italian family).
I make mine vegetarian, using jarred Victoria’s marinara sauce. My mother always used a heavy meat sauce in hers.
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Every lasagna I’ve ever had here is ricotta/mozz/parm, a very Italian American area.
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Another vote for the traditional ricotta/mozzarella/parm.
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Usually ricotta/mozz. But since my mother used cottage cheese and mozz, sometimes I do it that way too… especially if we already have cottage cheese in the fridge. Not a purist (unless company coming) - have used shredded cheddar when using up a big bag of it. Will skip meat or use a chopped up leftover pork chop. And sliced zuc instead of noodles when there was a garden glut of it.
Yeah, I wasn’t sure either so I just looked for some recipes using the fresh sheets. You could ask the shop where you buy them as well. I didn’t think to do that.
My H makes the traditional Mozzarella/ricotta style. I like to occasionally make the Northern style a la Marcella Hazan with Bechamel and her Bolognese sauce, it’s so good!
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I know Lasagna purists are sometimes appalled by the use of cottage cheese instead of Bechamel or ricotta, but I found an article on pros/cons of ricotta and cottage cheese that says the cottage cheese variety is half the calories per serving and 1/4 the fat. Some of my guests are very slim and calorie conscious, so they would probably appreciate that right before Thanksgiving. My mom used to make it like that, and we liked it just fine. On the fence about it. Maybe I could make a half pan of each.
Not going to lie, one time H and I were watching a Paula Deen cooking show, and she was making lasagna, and she said “if you don’t have ricotta cheese, you can just use cottage cheese” and we were a bit horrified, but any time someone mentions lasagna or ricotta cheese, we say that quote.
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I didn’t think my family would like the Marcella recipe but I went ahead and made it—a huge hit. I followed her recipe except I didn’t make the lasagna noodles, I bought sheets at an Italian market.
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All of her recipes from her cookbooks are excellent. They are very old fashioned Italian. Her classic Italian cookbooks from the 70s were what I used when I first got married as my only Italian cookbook (and I am 100% Italian)
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Many of my family’s favorites come out of her first cookbook!
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