Meat lasagna
Description
This recipe won't take much time. I really love lasagna. Very much. However, making delicious lasagna is a challenging task. Once I tried lasagna at a good Italian restaurant—it was love at first bite. Then, for several years, I kept trying to make lasagna myself at home, ate it at friends' places, ordered it at other restaurants—nothing was the same... And finally, after years of searching, I've found the best meat lasagna recipe. When I follow this recipe exactly, the lasagna turns out absolutely perfect—moist enough, but not too greasy, not dry... Just the way it should be. And I'm sharing this recipe with you. Enjoy, my dear friends! :) Serve hot.
Instructions
- 1
Step 1
So, first of all, let's prepare all the ingredients.
- 2
Step 2
Let's start by preparing the sauce. Make cross-shaped cuts on the tomatoes, place them in boiling water, and leave them there for 15-20 seconds. Then drain the water and set the tomatoes aside to cool down.
- 3
Step 3
Finely chop the onion and garlic. Heat a little olive oil in a frying pan, add the onion and garlic, and cook over medium heat, stirring, until soft. About 10 minutes.
- 4
Step 4
Grate the carrot and add it to the onion and garlic. Mix and cook over medium heat for another 7–10 minutes.
- 5
Step 5
Add the ground beef to the skillet, break it up with a spatula, and mix it with the vegetables.
- 6
Step 6
Stir and cook for about 20 minutes over medium heat.
- 7
Step 7
Then add the celery cut into cubes.
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Step 8
Add the bell pepper, cut into cubes, to the same pan.
- 9
Step 9
Mix.
- 10
Step 10
Chill the tomatoes, then blend them into a puree using a blender or food processor. Pour the resulting tomato puree into a skillet.
- 11
Step 11
Stir, add salt and pepper, and cook over medium heat for 5–7 minutes.
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Step 12
Finally, add chopped parsley, mix and remove from heat. The sauce is ready.
- 13
Step 13
Now it's time to prepare the béchamel sauce. Place the butter in a saucepan, set over medium heat, and melt the butter.
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Step 14
Add the flour and mix vigorously to prevent lumps from forming.
- 15
Step 15
Continue stirring until a homogeneous mass forms.
- 16
Step 16
Thinly pour milk into the homogeneous creamy mixture. Mix.
- 17
Step 17
Continue cooking and stirring until the sauce reduces to the consistency of thin sour cream. Then remove the sauce from the heat.
- 18
Step 18
It's time to assemble the lasagna. Carefully read the cooking instructions for your lasagna sheets. Some lasagna sheets need to be pre-boiled in water, while others do not require any pre-treatment. Follow the instructions as written. My sheets needed to be boiled, so I placed them into boiling water one by one (otherwise they will stick together) and cooked them for the time indicated in the instructions.
- 19
Step 19
Carefully remove the lasagna sheets from the boiling water and let them cool slightly.
- 20
Step 20
Place a layer of lasagna sheets into a lightly greased baking dish (if the dish and the sheets don't match in size, the sheets can be cut to fit).
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Step 21
Next, place about one-third of the filling.
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Step 22
Spread the filling layer evenly, then pour a small amount (about 1/4) of béchamel sauce on top.
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Step 23
Sprinkle with a cup of grated cheese.
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Step 24
Repeat the same procedure: a layer of noodles - a layer of filling - sauce - cheese. Continue until all ingredients are used up (I have 4 layers of lasagna sheets, therefore 3 layers of filling). The top layer should be lasagna sheets coated with béchamel sauce. Place the baking dish in an oven preheated to 180°C and bake for 40 minutes.
- 25
Step 25
Then we take the lasagna out of the oven, sprinkle it with grated Parmesan, and put it back in the oven for another 10 minutes. Once ready, remove the lasagna from the oven, let it cool slightly, then serve.
- 26
Step 26
Buon appetito!