Hello, lovely readers! I hope that wherever you are in the world you are well and staying warm and dry or enjoying the lovely sun!
As always, I bring you a recipe but not without our fun facts. This month, I bring you a warm, well why not say it a hot dish, one of my favorites: the lovely lasagna. You might wonder why lasagna? Well on 28 July it is International Lasagna Day!! Yes, peeps, it’s the day to celebrate this amazing dish. So, for this month’s article, we will discover where it started, is it with an e or an a at the end, and of course, a delicious recipe.
Pat Aguilar
@pataguilar_
Let’s start from the beginning, should we write lasagna or lasagne? These two little letters at the end seem like they are exchangeable and mean the same, but no. Some people might say it depends on if you are saying it in English or Italian, also a big no!
Lasagna is an Italian word, and we use an a at the end for singular, which means one sheet of lasagna. Lasagne it’s the plural of lasagna, meaning multiple sheets of pasta. So technically, because we use more than one sheet of pasta, the correct word should be lasagne.
Now, if you want to know about that English difference, yes, our friends from the US will say lasagna and our friends from the UK refer to it as lasagne.
If you keep searching for the difference between the a and the e at the end, you will find that there is a difference in how you prepare it. Lasagna refers to the dish that includes the delicious bechamel sauce, whilst lasagne du forno refers to a layered dish but the filling between the pasta sheet is mostly sauce. This option is easier so it’s used more as an everyday dish.
At the end of the day, if you write it with an e or an a, the pronunciation will be the same “nya” or “ña” for our Spanish speakers.
But the main question is, where did the dish start? The answer that comes to our minds is Italy, and yes, that is correct. The way lasagna is made these days, comes from Italy, Naples to be exact. But his origin comes from Greece. Let’s do a little timeline to make this clearer:
When I say Greece, I am referring to ancient Greece, pre-roman period BC. The word Lasagna (in this case) comes from the Greek laganon, which is the first form of pasta. The laganon wasn’t made with the ingredients we know today, but it was composed of layers of pasta and sauce exchanged. You can also find text that says the lasagna word comes from the Latin lassanum which means cooking pot. In old Greek, we can also find the word lassanon, which means chamber pot. The connection? That the lasagna must be made in a pot. Then we go to the Roman period, where you can also find a lasagna recipe, and here our roman friends used the Latin word lassanum (the one I previously mentioned) to refer to this dish.
Then in our little timeline, we find our British friends. There is a lasagna recipe from 1390 created by them, called Lozenges, which was a layer of pasta, with layers of cheese in between and they bake it. This sounds to me more like cheese pasta (mac and cheese to be exact, yummy!) not much as lasagna, but still, points for effort.
Finally, our Italian friends. Previous recipes mention that it was layers of pasta with herbs and sauces in between. Then with the arrival of tomatoes in Italy, they added to it. But it wasn’t until around the end of 1600 that the recipe of lasagna as we know it today was made. And here, we have two options, one from the north and one from the south. The first was the one from north of Italy from the Emilia Romana area, specifically, Bologna called lasagna a Bolognese. And then in the south from Napoli, called Lasagna Napoletana. The main difference is that Napoletana uses a layer of ricotta cheese and Bolognese uses a layer of bechamel sauce.
Interesting right? Well… all this writing about lasagna, has made me really hungry, so… it's cooking time!
Here I leave you a more traditional recipe of lasagna, with the alternative of using a ricotta layer or bechamel or white sauce. But as you might have realised, as long as you use pasta sheets and go by layers, it will always be a lasagna.
Ingredients
• 16 lasagna sheets
• 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
• 1 large onion
• 4 cloves garlic (crushed and minced)
• 28 oz vegan meatless meat that's crumbly or pulled type. If you prefer you can always use chopped mushrooms instead.
• 28 oz whole plum tomatoes (San Marzano tomatoes are best for this)
• 6 oz tomato paste
• 2 teaspoon oregano (or basil)
• 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 3 cups vegetable stock (reduce to 2 cups for regular noodles)
• Salt and ground black pepper to taste
• 1 cup vegan parmesan cheese
• 16 oz vegan mozzarella shreds
Alternatives for the sauce:
cashew ricotta:
• 1 ½ cup raw cashews (soaked 30 minutes, then drained)
• ¾ cup vegetable stock
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon oregano
• ¼ cup fresh parsley (chopped)
• Salt and ground black pepper to taste
Basic White Sauce:
• 3 Tbsp Olive Oil
• 2 Tbsp All-Purpose Flour
• 2 cups (480ml) Soy Milk (or other non-dairy milk)
Spices to taste:
• Ground Black Pepper
• Sea Salt
• Nutritional yeast for a cheese taste.
Instructions
If using regular lasagna noodles, cook them in salted boiling water until al dente but not mushy.
Make the meat sauce by heating the oil in a large saucepan. Add the onions and garlic. Sautee, until they soften, about five minutes. Add the "meat" crumbles and sautee for a couple of minutes. Add the tomato paste and mix in.
Put the plum tomatoes in a bowl and squish them to break with your fingers. Add to the saucepan along with 3 cups of vegetable stock if using no-boil noodles, and 2 cups of stock if using regular noodles that have been cooked.
Stir well, bring to a boil, and add the oregano, red pepper flakes, salt, and ground black pepper to taste. Stir and let the sauce cook for about 15 minutes or until it turns a bright red. Turn off the heat and check the seasoning. Set aside.
For the sauce alternative, I will explain how to make the ricotta one first:
Make the ricotta, by placing the cashews in a food processor with all ingredients except the parsley. Process for a couple of minutes until fairly smooth. Mix in the parsley and pulse until it's mixed into the rest of the ricotta. Set aside.
White sauce:
Add the oil to a pot on the stove and heat it at medium to high heat. As the oil heats, add the flour and stir or whisk vigorously. Add the soy milk all at once and continue to stir and whisk (you can alternate between a wooden spoon and a whisk) and allow the sauce to gradually thicken. You will usually get to the proper thickness after it has reached boiling point and boiled for a few minutes. Add spices and nutritional yeast to taste.
Now let’s build our lasagna
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
Assemble the lasagna by spraying a 12 X 9-inch lasagna pan with cooking spray or oil. Ladle out a small amount of sauce into the pan and spread. This can always be optional, due to the size you want to make the lasagna. You can always make it smaller if you like.
Layer on four sheets of the pasta into the bottom of the pan, or until covered.
Layer quarter of the meat sauce over the lasagna noodles.
Layer quarter of the cashew parmesan.
Layer quarte of the vegan mozzarella.
Layer quarter of the vegan ricotta or white sauce (why not both)
Repeat until you have built up three layers of the meat sauce and the cheeses. Over the fourth and final layer, layer the remaining meat sauce, parm and mozzarella.
Cover tight with aluminum foil, place the lasagna pan on a rimmed baking sheet, and bake in the preheated oven for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, remove the aluminum foil and bake another 30 minutes until bubbly and hot.
Let the lasagna stand for at least 15 minutes allowing it to firm up, then cut and serve.
A fact about me: I always make lasagna for Christmas eve dinner. It was my first Christmas Eve here in Australia, and I wanted to make dinner for my friends (a group of 4 Chileans spending our first Christmas here) and the only thing I knew how to cook properly ( or that I knew it was going to taste good) was lasagna, so that is why I did. To make it more Christmassy, I added spinach to the ricotta so it will have green and red layers. And became my tradition since then.
What are your traditions as a traveler? Share them with us by a message on Instagram or tag us in your posts, while making this recipe or any other one you prefer.
Happy Lasagna Day and happy cooking!!
