Lasagne bolognese
Italian food
Contents
↓ Jump to recipe<p>A good lasagne is a project, not a quick supper, and that is rather the point. You build it in three parts: a slow, savoury meat sauce, a smooth béchamel, and the layering and baking that binds them. Done properly, you end up with a deep, glossy ragù held between sheets of soft pasta and a nutmeg-scented white sauce, the top layer bronzed and bubbling at the edges. This version leans on pork shoulder and pancetta for richness and uses a little Worcestershire sauce, balsamic and ketchup to round out the tomato with a savoury, faintly sweet depth.</p>
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<div class="recipe-card-head"><p class="recipe-card-title">Lasagne bolognese</p>
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<div class="recipe-meta"><span class="recipe-meta-item"><span class="recipe-meta-label">Serves</span>6 servings</span><span class="recipe-meta-item"><span class="recipe-meta-label">Prep</span>30 min</span><span class="recipe-meta-item"><span class="recipe-meta-label">Cook</span>90 min</span><span class="recipe-meta-item"><span class="recipe-meta-label">Cuisine</span>Italian</span><span class="recipe-meta-item"><span class="recipe-meta-label">Course</span>Main course</span></div>
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<div class="recipe-ingredients">
<h3>Ingredients</h3>
<ul><li>20 oz pork shoulder</li><li>6 oz pancetta, diced</li><li>3 onions</li><li>2 tablespoons olive oil</li><li>4 celery stalks</li><li>3 carrots</li><li>2 large cans diced tomatoes</li><li>6 cloves garlic</li><li>1 cup white wine</li><li>1 cup beef broth</li><li>Lasagne sheets</li><li>5 tablespoons butter, 5 tablespoons flour, 1 cup milk and 2 oz grated Parmesan for the cheese sauce</li></ul>
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<div class="recipe-method">
<h3>Method</h3>
<ol><li>Chop the celery, carrots and onions into small cubes and finely cut the garlic.</li><li>Fry the pork shoulder and pancetta in a hot pot with olive oil until browned, then remove the meat.</li><li>Fry the vegetables with salt and pepper, then add Worcestershire sauce, balsamic vinegar, ketchup, garlic and white wine.</li><li>Return the meat, add the diced tomatoes and beef broth and simmer for at least 1 hour.</li><li>Make the cheese sauce by melting the butter, stirring in the flour, then the milk, then the Parmesan and a dash of nutmeg.</li><li>Butter a baking dish and layer lasagne sheets, meat sauce and cheese sauce, ending with cheese sauce on top.</li><li>Sprinkle with Parmesan and bake at 180C for 35 minutes.</li></ol>
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</div><h2 id="what-you-need">What you need</h2><div class="ad-unit ad-in-article" aria-label="Advertisement">
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<h3 id="utensils">Utensils</h3>
<h3 id="utensils-1">Utensils</h3>
<ul>
<li>Chopping board</li>
<li>Sharp knife</li>
<li>Pan</li>
<li>a small pot</li>
<li>square refractory dish/casserole suited for using in the oven</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="ingredients">Ingredients</h3>
<h4 id="meat-sauce"><strong>Meat sauce:</strong></h4>
<ul>
<li>20 oz pork shoulder</li>
<li>6 oz of pancetta, diced</li>
<li>3 onions</li>
<li>2 tablespoons of olive oil</li>
<li>4 celery stalks</li>
<li>3 carrots</li>
<li>2 large cans of diced tomatoes</li>
<li>6 cloves of garlic</li>
<li>1 cup of white wine</li>
<li>2 teaspoons Worcestershire Sauce</li>
<li>2 tablespoon ketchup</li>
<li>1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar</li>
<li>1 cup of beef broth </li>
<li>salt</li>
<li>pepper</li>
<li>a tablespoon of butter</li>
<li>Lasagne sheets - buy or <a href="/story/plain-pasta/">make some yourself</a></li>
</ul>
<h4 id="sauce"><strong>Sauce:</strong></h4>
<ul>
<li>5 tablespoons butter</li>
<li>5 tablespoons of flour</li>
<li>1 cup of milk</li>
<li>2 oz of grated Parmegiano</li>
<li>a dash of nutmeg</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="what-you-need-to-do">What you need to do</h2>
<p><strong>Meat sauce:</strong></p>
<ol>
<li>Chop celery, carrots and onions into small cubes</li>
<li>Finely cut the garlic</li>
<li>Fry the pork shoulder and panchetta in a searing hot pot with a dash of olive oil until browned</li>
<li>Remove the meat from the pot </li>
<li>Add a spoonfull of oil to the pot</li>
<li>Add the celery, carrots and onions to the pan with a pinch of salt and pepper</li>
<li>Fry the vegetables while stirring for one minute </li>
<li>Add the Worcestershire Sauce and the balsamic vinegar and keep stirring for a minute more</li>
<li>Add the ketchup and keep stirring while adding the garlic</li>
<li>Add the white wine to the mix</li>
<li>Add the meat back into the pot</li>
<li>Add the diced tomatoes and beef broth and let it simmer for at least one hour</li>
</ol>
<p><strong>Sauce:</strong></p>
<ol>
<li>Melt the butter in the small pot</li>
<li>Add the flour slowly while stirring</li>
<li>When all the flour has been added, slowly add milk while stirring (make sure it combines)</li>
<li>when all the milk has been added, dump in most of the parmegiano, and a dash of nutmeg and stir</li>
</ol>
<p><strong>Lasagne:</strong></p>
<ol>
<li>Use a bit of butter to coat your casserole/refractory dish</li>
<li>Place a layer of lasagne sheets on the bottom, then a layer of meat sauce and then a layer of cheese sauce</li>
<li>Continue building layers until you’ve used the ingredients (aprox 3-4 layers) - you should end up with a cheese sauce layer on top</li>
<li>Sprinkle a bit of parmegiano on top and place in a hot oven 180 °C / 356 °F for 35 minutes (5-7 minutes less if you’re using fresh lasagne sheets)</li>
</ol>
<h2 id="where-lasagne-comes-from">Where lasagne comes from</h2><div class="ad-unit ad-in-article" aria-label="Advertisement">
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<p>Layered pasta dishes are old, but the lasagne we recognise today belongs firmly to Emilia-Romagna, and to Bologna in particular. It is the home city of <em>ragù alla bolognese</em>, the slow-cooked meat sauce registered with the Bologna Chamber of Commerce in 1982 by the Accademia Italiana della Cucina in an effort to pin down a canonical recipe. Classic <em>lasagne alla bolognese</em> uses fresh egg pasta, often tinted green with spinach (<em>lasagne verdi</em>), layered with that ragù and a béchamel rather than the ricotta-heavy versions common in the United States.</p>
<p>The recipe here is a home cook’s take rather than a museum reconstruction. A traditional Bolognese ragù is built on beef and pork with milk and a splash of wine, simmered for hours until barely any liquid remains. This one uses pork shoulder and pancetta for a rich, savoury base, and leans on a little Worcestershire sauce, balsamic vinegar and ketchup to build umami and a gentle sweetness quickly, the way a weeknight kitchen actually works. It is not strictly authentic, but it is honest about what it is.</p>
<h2 id="the-two-sauces-and-why-they-matter">The two sauces, and why they matter</h2>
<p>The meat sauce needs time above all else. Browning the pork and pancetta hard before anything else builds the deep, roasted flavour that carries the whole dish; do it in a searing-hot pan so the meat colours rather than steams in its own juices. Then the long simmer, at least an hour, does the real work, softening the meat and reducing the tomatoes and wine into something thick and concentrated. If the sauce looks watery, keep simmering with the lid off until it thickens, because a wet ragù makes a sloppy lasagne.</p>
<p>The béchamel, the white sauce, is what keeps a baked lasagne moist and binds the layers. The technique is simple but unforgiving: melt the butter, stir in the flour and cook this <em>roux</em> for a full minute to lose the raw, floury taste, then add the milk gradually, whisking to keep it smooth. Add the milk too fast and you get lumps; those can usually be beaten or blitzed out with a stick blender, but it is easier to go slowly. Cook the finished sauce for a few minutes more until it thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon. A dash of nutmeg is traditional and worth it, its warm, slightly bitter note cutting through the richness of the cheese. Stir most of the Parmesan through the hot béchamel so it melts into the sauce, and keep a little back for the top.</p>
<p>The choice between the two sauces is what separates regional styles. Southern Italian and Italian-American lasagne often use ricotta and mozzarella in place of a cooked white sauce, giving a stringier, cheesier result. The northern Bolognese approach, with béchamel, produces a smoother, more custardy set that holds the layers together cleanly when you cut it. Both are good; this recipe follows the northern habit because the béchamel is what stops a long-baked lasagne from drying out.</p>
<h2 id="assembling-and-baking">Assembling and baking</h2>
<p>Aim for three or four layers, always finishing with béchamel and a scatter of Parmesan on top so the surface browns rather than drying out. Do not overfill: a thin, even layer of each sauce sets better than a thick, sliding one. Bake at 180C until the top is golden and the edges are bubbling, around 35 minutes, and knock five to seven minutes off if you are using fresh sheets, which cook faster than dried.</p>
<p>The hardest part is resisting the urge to cut straight in. Let the finished lasagne rest for 10 to 15 minutes out of the oven so the layers firm up; slice it hot from the dish and it will collapse into a delicious but shapeless heap. That rest also lets the sauces reabsorb, so the cut edges hold instead of weeping liquid onto the plate.</p>
<p>If you are using dried sheets, there is no need to pre-boil them provided both sauces are generously wet, because the pasta cooks and softens by absorbing moisture from the sauce during the long bake. Fresh sheets need even less, which is why they bake faster. Should the top brown before the middle is bubbling, lay a loose sheet of foil over the dish for the last 10 minutes so the surface does not scorch while the centre finishes heating through.</p>
<h2 id="tips-and-make-ahead">Tips and make-ahead</h2>
<p>The meat sauce is better made a day ahead, giving the flavours time to settle and deepen, and the fully assembled lasagne can be built and refrigerated a day before baking; add 10 minutes to the oven time if cooking it from cold. It reheats well and freezes for up to three months, either whole or in portions. To freeze, assemble it in a foil-lined dish, freeze until solid, then lift the whole block out, wrap it and return it to the freezer; you can drop it straight back into the same dish to bake. Defrost overnight in the fridge before baking, or bake from frozen at a slightly lower temperature, covered with foil, until piping hot right through to the centre.</p>
<p>Individual portions are the most useful thing to have in the freezer. Cut the cooled, baked lasagne into single servings, wrap each one, and you have a proper supper ready to reheat in a matter of minutes. A green salad sharpened with a mustardy dressing is the ideal partner, cutting through the richness of the béchamel and ragù, and a hunk of bread to mop the dish is never unwelcome. Cooked once and frozen in portions, a single afternoon’s work quietly feeds you for weeks. For a vegetarian bake using the same layering method and béchamel, try this <a href="/story/mushroom-spinach-lasagne/">mushroom and spinach lasagne</a>. If you would rather make your own pasta sheets from scratch, start with a batch of <a href="/story/plain-pasta/">plain fresh pasta</a>.</p>
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