I've been following Zen can Cook for a while. He probably doesn't even know I follow him 'cause I don't leave any comments or anything like that. But he's a private chef and he has some really great ideas.
I made this with a friend, Henry, for dinner yesterday. It was pretty tasty. The original recipe has a lot of components to it: fresh pasta for the lasagna (crazy!), ground meat/soffrito (soffrito is a process where they cook aromatic ingredients slowly sauteed for about half an hour), tellagio bechamel sauce (best basic sauce ever!), and to finish, a cilantro-vinegar froth. I definitely had to make this much more simplified...
Let's see, where to start. Store bought lasagna. Yes, a huge time saver, but make sure not to buy the "no boil" kind. It's dry as a desert, you don't want that. I took out a lot of ingredients in the ground meat mixture just because I didn't have it on hand nor did I want to buy it. For the bechamel, I used the cheese I had on hand, rosemary asiago. I just made to taste as I added it because I didn't want it to overpower everything. And totally adapted the cilantro-vinegar finish.
Hm, oh also, make sure to drain your ground meat mixture if it has a lot of fat...I thought about it, but didn't do it because I was hungry and so was Henry :P But please do it, it makes you feel a little better about eating the lasagna and there won't be a pool of fat lingering at the bottom of your pyrex. And lasagna noodles are a lot easier to cook if you have a GIGANTIC pot. Mine was a bit too small so some noodles didn't cook as nicely as others.
But overall, it was delicious, fatty, good. The kick from the cilantro finish was really nice. It helped cut the overall creamy, richness from the lasagna.
Lasagna "a la Zen" (recipe adapted from Zen can Cook) I'm going to put his version of the sofrito, but just tell you what I omitted. I think it would taste a whole lot better his way, so if you want to try this, I encourage you to do it his way.
Lasagna noodles:
-a box of lasagna noodles (I used 12 noodles)
1. Bring water in a large pot to a boil. Add a good amount of salt to the water. Add the noodles, a couple at a time and slowly submerge it in the water. Boil for about 8-9 minutes or however long the box says. Drain, and run under cold water to help stop the cooking process and separate the noodles.
Meat/Sofrito:
-3 Tbsp olive oil
-1 onion, minced
-1 red pepper, minced (omitted)
-1 garlic clove, chopped
-4 Tbsp tomato paste
-1 Tbsp chipotle pepper in adobo (omitted)
-1 1/2 lb ground meat (beef, lamb, turkey, etc, I used beef)
-3 Tbsp fresh cilantro, chopped
-1 Tbsp sesame oil
-2 tsp sugar
salt and freshly ground pepper
1. Heat olive oil in a large pan over medium-low heat. Add the onions and peppers stirring occasionally for 30 minutes.
2. Add the tomato paste, garlic, and chipotle, stirring until combined.
3. Add the ground meat, season and stir until cooked.
4. Add cilantro, sesame oil, and sugar, stir. Drain the fat if using a fatty meat, and set aside to cool.
Tallegio bechamel:
-2 Tbsp unsalted butter
-2 Tbsp all purpose flour
-2 cups whole milk
-8 oz tallegio cheese (I substituted with asiago, if you do not prefer strong cheeses, then pick one you like, preferably a white cheese)
-1 tsp salt
Tip: After you have made the basic sauce, taste it. Add some salt and cheese and taste again, repeat until you get the desired flavor. Don't just dump it all at once because it might be too salty.
This is also how I prepare the bechamel, it's a bit different from his method, a bit easier I think.
1. In a medium saucepan, melt the butter over medium low heat
2. Heat milk in the microwave in a microwave safe bowl/pyrex measuring cup for 2 minutes
3. Add the flour to the butter and whisk well until smooth, about 2 minutes.
4. Add a little bit of milk at a time to the butter flour mixture, stirring constantly, until about 1 cup is added. Then add the rest of the milk. Bring to a boil and boil for about 4-5 minutes, making sure to stir, so it doesn't burn at the bottom. It should thicken.
5. Remove from heat and add the cheese, salt, season as desired.
Finishing UP!
Blogger's note: this is my adjusted version of ingredients, I will post his after mine
-Parmesan, mozzarella cheese, any of your liking
-2 Tbsp red wine vinegar (it was really strong, I suggest using rice wine vinegar like he does)
-1 quarter small onion, minced
-1 cup of whole milk
-Salt and pepper
-1/2 bunch of cilantro
Zen's Version:
-Roasted Kabocha Squash (I have no idea what this is)
-Parmesan
-2 Tbsp rice wine vinegar
-1 shallot, chopped
-1 cup half and half
-Salt and pepper
-1/2 bunch of cilantro
1. Preheat oven to 350
2. Butter a glass baking dish, or spray with pam.
3. Layer a glass baking dish with three lasagna noodles. Add the meat mixture, extra cheese if you want (parmesan, mozzarella, etc), the bechamel, then another layer of noodles, and repeat. He actually ended the top layer with noodles so that he could finish it with the cilantro. If you do this, make sure the top layer is as moist as possible. Most likely it'll dry out like mine did and curl at the edges...shh, just don't serve people that part...
4. While baking, add vinegar to small saucepan with onions. Boil for 2 minutes, add half and half. (note: when I added the milk, because of the vinegar, it started to curdle/turn into buttermilk, once you reduce and blend it, it should be fine, but might be why he used half and half). Reduce for 3 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.
5. Place contents of saucepan in a blender, add cilantro and blend until frothy. Pour over lasagna.
Dang, these recipes I'm posting are long...maybe I'm just making them extra long...sorry!
But it was definitely good and made a wonderful lunch and dinner today :D
Thanks for stopping by, try this, or if this seems like too much work, there are many simpler versions of lasagna that just use bottled sauce, cheese, and ground beef. Lasagna is a great dish to eat later on during the week since there's so much!
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