Sunday dinner

Part two in a series of a week of dinners.

I have rarely if ever cooked a roast, and Sunday dinner here is usually something quick and easy, but since I'd gone shopping the day before and wasn't in a rush, I made something a bit more time consuming yesterday. It was going to be vegetarian lasagne, but then I discovered that there were only two sheets of lasagne left in the box I'd been counting on, so it turned into pasta bake. A little more effort, but just as yummy. This made a generous six servings: two on Sunday, two for Monday, and two for the freezer.

First I chopped up a large onion, a courgette (zuchinni) and a summer squash, and sauteed them in olive oil till soft. You could easily use mushrooms and aubergine (eggplant) instead or as well; these were just what I'd bought that day.

 

I added a jar's worth of roasted red peppers (I usually use a fresh one, but roasted adds an extra layer of flavour; or at least I like to think so), some halved grape tomatoes I had hanging around, and one very fat clove of garlic, crushed. 

 

Then I put in a tin of fire-roasted tomatoes and one of crushed tomatoes. If I'd had a jar of ready-made pasta sauce I'd have added some of that instead of one of the tins, but I didn't. I seasoned with salt, pepper, oregano, the end of a bottle of red wine that had been sitting in the kitchen waiting for its moment to shine, and a liberal shake of worcester sauce. Apparently I forgot to take a photo of this step, but when you've seen one big pot of tomatoey vegetable sauce simmering on a stove, you've pretty much seen 'em all.

 

Then I made the bechamel sauce. I know a lot of Americans (particularly) use some sort of thinned-out ricotta mixture for the white part of a lasagne, but this is how I learned to make it in Home Economics, so this is what I do. Melt two tablespoons of butter, stir in two tablespoons of flour, season, let cook for one minute, stirring all the time. Gradually add milk, enough to make as much sauce as you think you'll need. (I use as much milk as fits in my yellow-and-white striped jug. Maybe it's half a pint. I never quite have enough sauce.) It doesn't matter if it's too thin, because the cheese will thicken it up. Then stir in a good handful or two of grated cheese. I was virtuous and used cheddar that I grated myself instead of buying the ready-shredded stuff.

While this was going on, I had boiled the kettle and put on, begrudgingly, my pasta. (Begrudgingly because if I'd remembered to buy more lasagne, I wouldn't have needed to do this. But it's not exactly tricky.) I used a mixture of penne and spirals. When the pasta was done (or a tad underdone) and drained, I mixed in the cheese sauce.

 

Then the fun part. Since it was meant to be lasagne, I layered the components instead of just mixing them all together into one big muddle. It doesn't make much difference to the finished product, but it feels good.

 

I started with a small layer of pasta, then tomato sauce, then some fresh spinach since I had it to hand, then pasta again, sauce, spinach, and finally the very last of the pasta on top, and more grated cheese to fill in the spaces.

Bake at 350 F for 30 minutes or until bubbling. Let stand for ten minutes before dishing up, lest you burn your mouth.

Serve, in this case, with a very nice Pinot Grigio. I like my white dry, very cold, and almost completely colourless.