Lasagna Béchamel

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For the first 20-some years of my life, I absolutely hated lasagna. I. HATED. IT. What was Garfield’s obsession with it? I mean, hating Mondays, I get it. But that nasty, mushy mess people call lasagna just didn’t make sense to me.

Then I tried lasagna béchamel and I understood the hype.

And this lasagna here is about as good as it gets. I’ve been tinkering with this recipe for a while and not only is this lasagna downright delicious, it is simple enough for even the laziest of homecookrs.

First off, lets gets some background. “Lasagne” is the name of the noodles that go in a “lasagna“, the casserole type pasta dish we’re making today. Lasagne noodles come in a few varieties: fresh – found in the refrigerated section of the store, typically more expensive but usually high quality and ready to bake; dried – your typical lasagne noodle in a box with the rest of the dried pasta which requires you to boil the noodles first before assembling your lasagna; and no-boil – found next to the dry lasagne but ready to go straight into the dish without pre-boiling. Or if you want to really get into it, you can make fresh pasta sheets from scratch. But that’s not this recipe.

As a homecookr, there is a balancing act that goes on in all of our heads weighing the cost/benefit between effort and taste. If you take the time to make fresh pasta sheets from scratch, your lasagna could taste better than using store bought noodles but how much better will it actually be? Will it be so much better that it’s worth the extra hour of work? Sometimes it is worth it and you appreciate the end result that much more because of how much work you put into it, but sometimes you can cut corners and end up with something that is nearly as good with half the work.

That’s where no-boil lasagne sheets come in. Being a perfectionist and a bit of a snob at times, I was skeptical of no-boil lasagne. I’ve made pasta from scratch and if you’ve never made it before it’s definitely worth your time to at least try it – it can be a fun experience and the resulting pasta blows dried pasta out of the starchy, salty water it cooks in. If you’re making a carbonara or some other pasta dish where the noodles are the star, scratch pasta – or at least fresh pasta from the refrigerated section – is worth it.

But lasagne noodles are not the star of a good lasagna. So I use no-boil sheets in this recipe. Go ahead and sub in whatever lasagne noodles you want. But focus your efforts on the bolognese and the béchamel.

What’s bolognese?

Bolognese is essentially a fancy word for meat sauce. At it’s heart it is meat, veggies, and tomatoes, simmered at great length to make a thick, rich sauce perfect for pasta. But everyone seems to have their own idea of what makes a bolognese a bolognese, and recipes vary wildly. Traditionally, bolognese is heavy on the meat and the tomatoes take a back seat. Most recipes add in some kind of wine, cream, and sometimes chicken stock.

I’m sure there will be purists out there who say my bolognese isn’t a true bolognese because that’s not how their nonna made it. But I don’t care about your nonna. My bolognese starts with a mirepoix of onion, celery, and carrot – if you want to add in green bell pepper, you go ahead and do that, just make sure you finely chop everything into small bits. Saute that in olive oil and once the veggies start to soften, add in minced garlic (cook for a minute or two), then cover everything in tomato paste. Incorporate the tomato paste and cook a little, then start browning the ground beef (I prefer 80/20 because fat = flavor). The fat will render out of the meat and your sauce will look oily/watery – don’t worry! Continue browning the meat until the oily/watery sauce has evaporated, then deglaze the pot with red wine. Many recipes call for white wine but I think red goes better with this meaty, tomatoey sauce.

Cook down the wine for a bit, then add in tomato sauce or puree as well as diced or crushed tomatoes. I use fire-roasted diced tomatoes to give it an extra element of flavor but some people swear by their San Marzano crushed tomatoes. Use what you want. I like the chunks that you get with diced tomatoes so that’s what I use. Bring everything to a simmer and let it do it’s thing for a while, maybe an hour or so. Add milk or cream near the end and season with salt, pepper, italian herbs, crushed red pepper for spice, and maybe even a little sugar to balance everything out – taste the sauce and adjust it to how you like it.

Once you’re satisfied, it’s ready to go in your lasagna. But we can’t forget what makes this lasagna unique: the béchamel!

What’s béchamel?

Béchamel is essentially a fancy word for cream sauce. Chefs like using fancy foreign words to try to confuse and scare off homecookrs. It’s pretty simple though – you start by making a roux (equal parts butter and flour whisked together and quickly cooked over medium-low heat) and whisking in milk. Melt butter over medium-low heat, whisk in flour and cook for about 1 minute. You can cook the roux for longer to get a darker color, but you don’t need to go overboard, just enough to cook the raw flour a bit. Once you’re happy with your roux, pour in the milk in a slow, steady stream while whisking continuously. Keep stirring as sauce thickens (you may need to bump up the heat to medium, just don’t go too high or you’ll ruin your sauce), and salt and pepper to taste, or even add some nutmeg if you’re feeling adventurous. You have made a béchamel.

But we’re not done here. Most lasagnas you’ve had have probably had a mixture of ricotta and mozzarella cheese in between the layers of bolognese and lasagne noodles but instead of that ricotta mixture, we are using a béchamel cheese sauce. This was the epiphany that made me understand the hype behind lasagna. What I hated about lasagna was the ricotta: grainy, flavorless, a huge bummer all around. The béchamel on the other hand is creamy, flavorful, and a complete game changer.

But béchamel itself is just a cream sauce – we need to mix in come cheese to get that cheesy goodness that lasagna is known for. So once the béchamel is about ready, throw in some parmesan and mozzarella and once it’s melted in, you’re ready to start assembling your lasagna.

Alright, enough talking, lets get into the recipe!