Go Back

Lasagna

Falak
5 from 1 vote
Print Recipe
Course Main Course
Cuisine American, Italian
Servings 12 servings

Ingredients
  

Ingredients for Meat Sauce

  • 500 grams ground beef (can use ground chicken too)
  • 4 tablespoons oil
  • 2 large onions (chopped)
  • 2 teaspoon ginger- garlic paste
  • 1 teaspoon black pepper powder
  • 3 tablespoons ketchup OR tomato paste
  • 1 ½ teaspoon salt
  • ¾ cup pasta sauce (or blend 2 tomatoes)
  • 1-2 teaspoon red chili powder
  • ½ tablespoon Sriracha sauce (or any favorite hot sauce)
  • ¼ teaspoon oregano
  • 1 teaspoon garam masala
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice

Ingredients for White Sauce

  • 3 tablespoons butter
  • 3 tablespoons all purpose flour
  • 3 cups liquid milk
  • ⅛ teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon black pepper powder

Other Ingredients

  • 9 lasagne sheets (oven-baked or normal)
  • 2-3 cups shredded cheese
  • aluminum foil (lightly brush oil on one side)
  • extra oregano or Italian herbs

Instructions
 

Preparing Meat Sauce:

  • In a large saucepan on medium-high heat, add oil. Add onions and fry until translucent.
  • Add ginger garlic paste, black pepper powder and ground beef and sauté until the meat changes color.
  • Then, add pasta sauce, ketchup/tomato paste, salt, red chili powder, Sriracha. Give it a stir, cover and cook until meat is almost ready (will take around 15 minutes).
  • Finally, add garam masala, oregano and lemon juice and switch off the heat.
  • You should end up with a meat mixture that should not be dry.

Preparing white sauce:

  • In a saucepan on medium-high heat, melt butter and add the all purpose flour.
  • Using a whisk, keep stirring and cook for about one minute. This will remove the raw smell and taste of the flour.
  • REMOVE THE SAUCEPAN FROM THE HEAT and add in the milk slowly, whisking continuously to prevent any lumps from forming.
  • Once all the milk is added and there are no lumps, move the saucepan back to the heat and add in the salt and black pepper powder.
  • Keep stirring with a spatula until the sauce thickens. Make sure to keep stirring continuously, or the sauce will stick to the bottom of the saucepan and burn.
  • The sauce will not thicken too much, and it still will be a little bit runny.

Assembling the Lasagna

  • Preheat the oven at 350 °F.
  • Grease an oven-proof dish. You can use a 9 x 13 inch dish or two 8 x 8 dishes.
  • Add ¼ cup of the white sauce to the bottom of the dish (this will prevent your lasagna sheets from burning or sticking to the dish).
  • Then, start layering in the following order:
    sheet ------> meat sauce -----> white sauce -----> cheese
  • Continue this layering pattern until all your sheets and meat sauce is used.
  • Sprinkle on some extra cheese to the final layer. Sprinkle some oregano or Italian herbs too.
  • Cover the baking dish with aluminum foil with the oiled side facing down.
  • Bake for 40 minutes.
  • After 40 minutes, remove the foil and broil on the LOW setting for 3 to 4 minutes only.
  • Remove from the oven and let your lasagna cool for 30 minutes before cutting into it to get cleaner cuts.

Notes

  1. Ground beef can be substituted by ground chicken.
  2. Don't dry out the meat mixture, it should be saucy but not runny.
  3. Use a whisk when adding milk to make the white sauce. The whisk prevents lumps from forming.
  4. Broiling in the end gives a lovely golden color to the cheese.