MUM’S LASAGNE

Italian Family Food by Silvia Colloca

The same amount of excitement reserved for cannelloni is displayed when Mum announces she’s making lasagne. Lasagne is code for ‘big family gathering’ and my relatives would stage a civil protest if Mum didn’t create her signature dishes. These days, with seven grandchildren and many grandnieces and nephews, ‘operation lasagne’ is a big undertaking, one that Mum evaluates with her usual precision. She makes the ragù in advance, ready to be used on the day, and cooks enough to fill up two large trays, each stacked with a minimum of six layers of pasta sheets. First, she wets the tray with a ladleful of sauce, then in goes a layer of pasta, more sauce, a good drizzle of besciamella (we never do thick layers of white sauce, that is an all-Aussie tradition!), grated parmigiano, a few torn-up bocconcini, then the second layer begins … it’s epic!

Serves 6–8

INGREDIENTS

RAGÙ

80 ml (1/3 cup) extra-virgin olive oil

1 onion, roughly chopped

1 carrot, roughly chopped

1 celery stalk, roughly chopped

400 g beef mince

300 g pork sausages, squeezed out of their casings

salt flakes and freshly ground black pepper

200 ml red wine (such as Chianti, Sangiovese or Pinot Noir)

3 x 400 g cans chopped tomatoes, or 1.2 litres passata

1–2 bay leaves

PASTA DOUGH

500 g (3⅓ cups) plain or type 00 flour

5 eggs

BESCIAMELLA

60 g unsalted butter, plus extra for greasing and dotting

60 g plain or type 00 flour

750 ml (3 cups) milk

salt flakes

pinch of freshly grated nutmeg

TO ASSEMBLE

200 g (2 cups) freshly grated parmigiano

400 g bocconcini, torn

RECIPE:

To make the rag., heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over medium heat, add the onion, carrot and celery and cook for 2–3 minutes until softened. Add the beef and sausage meat and brown over high heat, breaking up any lumps with a wooden spoon, for 3–4 minutes. You may need to brown the meat in batches so that it doesn’t stew. Season with a pinch of salt, then deglaze the pan with the wine, scraping up any bits caught on the base, and cook off the alcohol for 2–3 minutes.

Add the tomatoes or passata and bay leaves and bring to a simmer. Reduce the heat to low, then cover and cook for 3–4 hours until the rag. has reduced slightly, and is rich and flavoursome. You want your rag. to be quite wet, as the sauce will cook the pasta sheets in the oven. Taste and season with salt and pepper.

To make the pasta dough, place the flour on a wooden chopping board, make a well in the centre and drop in the eggs and 2 pinches of salt. Combine using your fingers or a fork, then knead vigorously for about 10 minutes. At first the dough will be crumbly, but once your body heat activates the starch in the flour, the dough will change in texture, transforming into a smooth, firm ball. (If you want to speed things up, you can mix the dough ingredients in a food processor until they resemble wet sand, then tip the mixture onto a floured board, bring it together with your hands and knead for 1 minute.) Cover the dough in beeswax wrap and let it rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Cut the pasta dough into quarters. Work with one piece at a time and keep the rest wrapped to prevent it drying out. Flatten the piece of dough with the palm of your hand, then pass it through the pasta machine’s widest setting three or four times, folding the dough into thirds each time. Continue passing the dough, each time through a thinner setting, until you get to the second-last setting or the lasagne sheet is roughly 3 mm thick. If you don’t have a pasta machine, you can use a rolling pin and a lot of elbow grease.

To make the besciamella, melt the butter in a small saucepan over medium–low heat, add the flour and cook, stirring, for 1–2 minutes. Slowly pour in the milk and whisk vigorously to remove any lumps. Bring to a simmer and cook for 6–8 minutes, stirring with a wooden spoon until thickened. Season with a pinch of salt and the nutmeg and set aside.

Preheat your oven to 200°C (180°C fan-forced). Grease a 45 cm x 30 cm lasagne dish with butter. Cut the pasta into sheets to fit your dish.

To assemble, spread a ladleful of ragù over the base of the dish and top with a layer of lasagne sheets. Add a layer of ragù, then a layer of besciamella, and sprinkle with a little parmigiano and bocconcini. Repeat with the remaining ingredients to create 6–7 layers. Finish with a ladleful each of rag. And besciamella and a final dusting of parmigiano.

 Scatter over a few dots of butter, then cover with foil and bake for 20 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for a further 10–15 minutes until golden and bubbling on top. Leave to rest, covered with foil, for 30 minutes before serving.