Ready in 75 minutes
Serves 4- 6 people
Difficulty Intermediate
Ingredients
250gm raw lasagna (preferably Barilla)
500gm ground beef
1 small onion (chopped)
½ a green bell pepper (chopped)
½ a red bell pepper (chopped)
½ a yellow bell pepper (chopped)
4 medium mushrooms (chopped)
1 ½ chicken bouillon cubes
1 jar of pizza sauce
100gm butter
4 tbsp flour
1 tsp minced garlic
1L cooking cream
½ L Full cream milk
400 gm grated mozzarella cheese
Vegetable Oil
Dried Parsley
Thyme
Salt and Pepper
Preparation
In a medium sized pot, heat a tbsp of vegetable oil on high heat. Add garlic and onion, stirring quickly. Once they start to turn light brown, add bell peppers and mushrooms. Stir well then add ground beef. Mix and let cook on low heat for 20 minutes.
In another pot, melt the butter then add the flour and mix well on medium heat until the flour turns light brown. Add half the cooking cream slowly while stirring to avoid clots. When the sauce starts to thicken, add the remaining cooking cream and 1 bouillon cube and let sit on medium heat for 10 minutes, stirring frequently.
When the cream thickens, turn off the heat and add a pinch of salt and pepper to taste.
After the ground beef simmers, keep on low heat and add ½ a bouillon cube, a sprinkle of thyme, a pinch of salt and pepper, and the whole jar of pizza sauce. Mix well and let simmer for another 10 minutes.
Heat the oven to medium-high.
Use cooking spray to lubricate the bottom and sides of a medium baking dish or oven pan.
Once the beef is done cooking, start layering your lasagna in the dish. Start with a layer of cream sauce at the bottom. Next, lay out one layer of lasagna noodles followed by one layer of meat then a generous layer of cream sauce. Top the layer of sauce with grated mozzarella then repeat one more time (lasagna, meat, sauce, cheese.) Cover the last layer of sauce with lasagna noodles then top with all remaining sauce. Sprinkle a generous amount of grated cheese on the top followed by a sprinkle of dried parsley.
Place dish in the oven for 30 minutes on medium-high heat.
When your lasagna is cooked, turn off the main oven heat and use you top grill heat to cook the top of your lasagna. This should take 5 - 10 minutes. Keep checking on the lasagna while you brown the top to avoid burning and make sure that all sides are cooking together.
Remove lasagna from the oven and let cool for 10 - 15 minutes before cutting. It will still be very hot, but cutting it too soon will cause it to seperate.
Tips
You can also use a hand-held browning torch to cook the top of your lasagna. This works well if you want to see how dark it gets as you work.