Something to Say About Lasagna

A friend of mine recently asked for my input on a lasagna she was planning to make. "Hmmmm," I thought to myself, "I don't really have much to say about lasagna." Ha! As it turned out, I had more to say than I initially thought. That is probably the truth about far too many things in life.

I started off with an innocent enough thought about sausage. In my mind I saw a rather traditional lasagna with a meaty tomato sauce and I didn't want plain ground beef in that sauce. Not even plain ground beef, browned and seasoned with salt and pepper and oregano. No, it had to be sausage. And very good sausage please. I said go to Dipasquale Sausage on Watertown Street in Nonantum (if you're outside the Boston area search out your best local sausage maker) and buy their fresh sweet Italian sausage. Remove the skins. Saute. Drain. This will be the meat for the sauce. Oh so good.

Then I started thinking about cheese. I use ricotta. Not everyone does, I know, but I do. Mixed with egg and freshly grated Pecorino Romano. You could use a freshly grated Parmigiano if you like that better, but I prefer the tangy, sharp jolt of Pecorino over the mellow roundness of Parmigiano. Call me crazy. That's okay. I can take it. Then freshly chopped flat leaf parseley. No compromises here: must be fresh.

Another key here as regards the cheese: double the recipe. Whatever the recipe calls for in terms of quantity for the cheese - double it. Otherwise you'll find yourself putting skimpy little layers in and I don't like skimpy in a lasagna.

Then my brain goes to pasta. Barilla no-boil noodles are fine, if that's the best you can manage, but fresh egg pasta sheets will revolutionize even the most traditional lasagna. My girls made a lasagna that was Prego sauce, shredded mozzerella, Trader Joe's meatballs (sliced in half) and egg pasta sheets - it was out of this world... which says a lot about the role of the noodle in this dish. One extra note here: if you are making the lasagna a day or two ahead of when it will be baked then you might want to stick with the Barilla no-boil noodles... cooked noodles can get too soft and gummy if they sit around waiting to be baked. If you are planning on assembling and baking right away - well, do the right thing and get the egg pasta.

Whole Foods carries fresh pasta sheets and Williams-Sonoma carries a dried egg noodle pasta for lasagna that requires cooking, but which makes a fine lasagna.

Then there is sauce. Time for true confessions. I use Prego (the shame! the shame!), but if you really want to ramp up your lasagna either make your own or buy a fresh sauce in the refrigerator section of the supermarket.

Don't forget the pan! You need an extra deep baking dish for this and since I don't have one, I always buy an extra deep foil pan and use that with a solid cooky sheet underneath to give it a firm base. It makes a world of difference to plenty of room to make your layers and still have enough pan to extend beyond so nothing is seeping, oozing, dripping over... you get the picture. Not pretty.

Ah, yes Lasagna. I don't really have that much to say on the subject. Do I?