Random recipe thread

BaZmO* wrote: »

Sounds lovely.

Just out of interest, what difference would it make if the lemon was waxed/unwaxed if you're only using the juice?

Dolbert wrote: »

Cola chicken (serves 4)

Fry 2 chopped onions, 4 chopped chicken breasts and a chopped pepper for a few minutes. Add a tin of tomatoes, a couple of crushed garlic cloves, 200ml chicken stock and a can of cola (I used diet coke but either is fine). Add a dash of soy or Worcester sauce, some sweet or smoked paprika, some cumin and salt to taste. Let it all simmer and thicken for about 20 minutes and serve with rice.

When I make lasagne, I make a large batch of sauce and freeze the extra in batches. This recipe makes a 6-portion lasagne, plus two 4-portion batches of bolognese, which I freeze. Handy when late in from work and want to make something that two fussy toddlers are guaranteed to love.

I have made The Sweeper's recipe and although it is nice, I prefer a sloppy lasagne. I have borrowed quite a few bits, notably how to fry the meat, which is a game changer.

Ingredients:

1 large onion

2-3 carrots

6-8 sticks of celery

1 tablespoon dried thyme

1 bulb of garlic

1 chilli or tablespoon of chilli powder

6 tins of chopped tomatoes (I use Mutti finely chopped)

1650g mince beef of medium fat content (I use 10%)

Worcestershire sauce

2 stock pots

4 heaped tablespoons oregano

1 heaped tablespoon Italian herbs

1 heaped tablespoon basil

50g butter

1oz plain flour (I use the scoop that comes with Odlums pack)

Half a nutmeg, freshly grated (or 1 teaspoon ground)

Approx 200ml milk

Two balls of mozzarella

Approx 9 dried pasta sheets (or more/less depending on dish size)

Method:

1. Heat a large casserole pot on medium/high and add a generous glug of olive oil. Very roughly chop the onion, carrot and celery. Like, quarter the onion and break that up. Don't bother peeling the carrot; just chop into half disks, etc. Add in the thyme. Reduce to medium and cover with lid. Let the veg sweat for about 15 minutes.
2. Peel and crush/halve the garlic cloves and roughly chop the chilli. Take the lid off and stir in the garlic. Let the juices evaporate for 2-3 minutes, then add the tins of tomatoes. Stir through the Italian herbs and one tablespoon of oregano. Put the lid half-on to let steam escape (I usually have a wooden spoon sticking out) and let it simmer for an hour. Take off the heat and let it sit for 30 minutes.
3. Using a stick blender, blend the contents of the pot until it has a soup-like consistency. Add a tablespoon of oregano and a generous glug of EV olive oil and put on a low/medium heat.
4. Heat a frying pan and add the tiniest amount of oil possible. Fry the meat in small batches (using The Sweeper's method), adding in a few drop of Worcestershire sauce with each batch. When each small batch is done, add to the sauce.
5. Add the rest of the oregano and the two stock pots and let pot simmer on low/medium for 30 mins.
6. Béchamel sauce time! Heat a saucepan on medium and add the butter. When melted and starting the pop, add the flour and whisk through. While the flour is cooking, grate in the nutmeg and stir through. After no more than 3 minutes of flour cooking time, add in the milk in batches, stirring until it has been absorbed by the flour. If the milk has been fully absorbed and the sauce is very runny, stop adding milk. Leave it on low while prepping the dish.
7. Add a scraping of meat sauce to the bottom of the dish and add pasta on top. Then add a layer of meat sauce, more sheets, then half the béchamel. Break up one ball of mozzarella into the béchamel. Cover in another layer of meat sauce, then pasta sheets, then a thin layer of meat sauce. Pour on the remaining béchamel and swirl it through the top meat sauce layer. Top with the remaining mozzarella.
8. Let the lasagne sit for up to 30 minutes, then cook in the middle of the oven at 170C for 40 minutes. Turn 10 minutes from the end if your oven is prone to hot spots. Sit for 10 minutes before serving.

Some notes:

• My regular lasagne dish perfectly fits 3 sheets, hence the call for 9 in total. Modify this if you wish.
• I use Knorr beef stock pots. You can use Oxo cubes if you wish.
• I use the clear-ish olive oil for frying but use the extra virgin for flavouring the sauce.
• I sometimes heat the milk in a separate saucepan with some frozen chopped onions in it to extract the onion-ey flavour before adding to the béchamel, but it doesn't make enough difference to be worth it IMO.
• You can use a bag of grated mozzarella if feeling lazy. I sometimes use a ball for the middle and grated for the top.
• Using bay leaves during the initial simmer with the tomatoes is a good idea but I hate trying to fish them out of this volume of sauce, so usually don't bother.
• If my description of the layers is confusing, here is the layout:

Mozzarella

Mix of meat sauce and béchamel

Layer of paste sheets

Normal layer of meat sauce

Layer of béchamel sauce with mozzarella

Layer of paste sheets

Normal layer of meat sauce

Layer of paste sheets

Thin layer of meat sauce

Bottom of dish