Posted on by The Medlar

Winter Lasagne

I’ve got two lasagne recipes, one for winter and one for summer. They differ in the richness of the sauce and the use of seasonal veg. This is the winter one, and has a couple of variations. The cooking times are based on using fresh pasta sheets. If you use dry you’ll need to soak/pre-cook I guess.

Prep: 10min Cook: 10min Making the layers: 3min Cooking: 18min

Lasagne just out of the oven

Ingredients white sauce

25g butter

1 heaped dstspn plain flour

500ml milk

50g grated cheddar

1 chopped mozzarella

20g grated parmesan

2 sheets Leerdammer chopped

Ingredients for layers

200g venison mince (can use beef)

200g cubed squash (crown prince/butternut)

1 chopped onion

500ml passata

1 basil cube

2 crushed garlic cloves

50ml red wine

Method sauce

  1. melt the butter into a small pan, mix in the flour and cook gently.
  2. slowly add in the milk stirring the ensure a smooth white sauce. Add the cheddar, Leerdammer and 1/2 the parmesan.
  3. Season with salt and pepper.

Method filling

  1. Fry the onion, mince and squash in olive oil. When the mince is browned add the garlic and basil.
  2. After a few second to fry off the garlic add the passata and red wine and cook until you have a thick bolognaise type sauce. Season with salt and pepper.

Method – layering up and cooking

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 225c (fan)
  2. put a thin layer of the bolognaise in the bottom of a lasagne dish,
  3. cover with fresh sheet pasta.
  4. repeat this (so two layers of bolognaise) then do one layer with about 1/2 the white sauce.
  5. Follow this up with 1 more layer of the bolognaise before topping out with the rest of the white sauce.
  6. Sprinkle of the parmesan and mozzarella.
  7. Cook for 18 min until golden.
Just going in the oven

This is a winter dish – the cheeses and the red wine add lots of richness. I use about 300g fresh pasta rolled into sheets to give me the right amount for this dish (see the pasta recipe), and remember that weight includes the water…

I always like to add one layer of the white sauce into the middle – to me it adds something to the overall unctuousness. If you want to (and it’s great), for the layer of white sauce, mix this with 150ml of courgette base/soup. You heat the courgette, make sure it’s seasoned then mix with some white sauce. This bulks the dish up and makes it even richer.

To tone down the richness you can omit the red wine, and mozzarella.