Roasted Meat Lasagne

I will warn you now... this is seriously good.  It is a Jamie Oliver recipe although in his recipe he uses a combination of 5 meats: rabbit, pheasant, duck, pigeon and venison to make his Italian Hunters Lasagne. That is all a bit too hard for most, including me, so let's do it with Beef.  If you really want to knock yourself over with flavor... use Lamb. And as I've done many times, I use a combination of Beef and Lamb and it works so well.

This recipe is not quick but it is SO worth the effort.   I normally roast the meat and shred it at least the day before and make the meat ragu. It obviously gives it more time for the flavors to intensify, and then it just leaves me to make the white sauce on the day and pull it all together ready to bake.

I think what makes this different to a any other lasagne I would usually make is that the flavors are separated differently.  The onions and parsley are used in the white sauce, not in with the tomatoes, and the triple cooking of the meat makes the meat so incredibly tender and rich.

Ingredients:
Beef / Lamb : 2-3lbs (1-1.5 kg) of roasted, shredded meat.  So more like 4-5 lbs (2- 2.5kg) raw meat.

Tomato Sauce:
Extra Virgin Olive oil
3 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
sprig of rosemary
3 bay leaves
3 x 400g tins of good tomatoes

White Sauce:
3 cups of milk
a xml handful of fresh parsley, roughly chopped
1/2 tspn nutmeg
1/2 onion, peeled and sliced
6 black peppercorns
80g (2 3/4 ounces) butter
65g (2 1/4 ounces) plain flour
150g (5 1/2 ounces) parmesan cheese
sea salt and ground black pepper

To Finish:
grated mozzarella cheese, 100g (4 oz)
fresh mozzarella balls
sage leaves
lasagne sheets
* homemade fresh pasta sheets are obviously the best way to go with this dish but after all this effort you may not want to spend the extra time, I totally get it.  If you can buy some good fresh lasagne sheets, fantastic, otherwise the packet sheets are fine - just soak them first for a few minutes in hot water before compiling the dish to ensure they will cook through.


Method:
Meat Ragu:

• Pre heat your oven to 425'F
• I always sear the meat/s in the roasting tray on top of the stove before placing it in the oven. It helps to keep the juices in and creates a lovely crust and adds to the flavor. 
• Rub your meats with salt and pepper and extra virgin olive oil before searing for 2-3minutes on each side.
• For the beef - then spread a thin smear of dijon mustard over your beef and roast for usually around 50-75 minutes depending on (the size) of cut of meat, (23-25mins per pound for medium rare).  
• For the lamb, make three or four incisions into the meat and poke a sprig of rosemary and a clove of garlic into each cut before roasting for the roughly the same amount of time. 
• When it's done, and slightly underdone is good, remove it from the oven and allow to rest.

• Once cooled, strip all the meat and place in a bowl.  You do this by using a fork and shredding the meat by hand, which gives you the best result.  You can use a mini food processor and break it up into chunky pieces.  You do NOT want it ground so use a processor sparingly and only when your hand is so sore you can't keep going!

• Heat a pan and add a splash of extra virgin olive oil
• Slowly fry the garlic until colored, then add the rosemary, bay leaves and tomatoes.
• Cook gently for 45 minutes with the lid on
• Add the shredded meat to the tomato sauce with a little hot water if it's too dry, season well
• Simmer for 20 - 25minutes, stirring every now and then
• Remove the rosemary and the bay leaves
• Set aside to cool.
• Store in an airtight container until needed, or freeze if necessary at this point.

White sauce:

• Put the milk, parsley, nutmeg, onion and peppercorns into a saucepan and gently bring to just a boil
• Strain the milk and then put it back into the saucepan to keep warm
• In a separate saucepan, melt the butter and add the flour.
• Add the hot milk one ladle at a time until you have a thick smooth white sauce.  
• Once it's combined and heated through, add the parmesan and season if necessary

layer the meat, pasta, white sauce

Final Compilation of Dish:

• Preheat the oven to 360'F
• Boil the kettle and soak the lasagne sheets for 2-3minutes (if using store bought)
• Butter a large baking dish
• Add a thin layer of meat ragu to the bottom of the baking dish, add a little extra water if necessary to give the pasta something to cook against.
• Lay pasta sheets over meat, up over the sides if desired.
• Layer meat ragu over pasta
• Add a thin layer of white sauce
• Repeat with pasta sheets, meat, white sauce until you've run out of meat.
• Finish top layer with pasta, white sauce, a sprinkle of parmesan cheese, mozzarella cheese and fresh mozzarella balls
• Scatter some ripped sage leaves on top, drizzle with a little olive oil and bake for 45 -50 minutes until golden brown.

Serve this with a beautifully simple fresh mix leaf salad, pine nuts and shaved parmesan.  

Drizzle with my favorite combination of dressing:

- good extra virgin olive oil

- fig balsamic (Old Town Oil - Chicago)

- squeeze of lemon juice

- drop of minced ginger

- touch of white sugar

- sea salt and pepper

give it a good shake and that's it!  

An absolutely killer lasagne which will be hard to beat!