Okay, so this is not for the faint of heart. This lasagna is a deliciously heavy dish that takes quite a while to make. I made a version of a traditional Italian Ragù sauce. Combine the ragu with a creamy béchamel sauce for the perfect lasagna. This is hands down the best combination I have ever had.
Be prepared: It takes about 4-5 hours to make. Some prep, 3 hours for the sauce, then construction, and 35-40 minutes of baking. But let me tell you, IT IS SO WORTH IT!
I love this youtube guide for making béchamel. I use her recipe and methods for this part. Christine Cushing is amazing and this is the best béchamel I’ve ever had!
Have you ever had béchamel sauce with your lasagna?
Lasagna With Béchamel Sauce
This recipe uses a traditional Italian Ragù sauce and a creamy béchamel sauce. This is hands down the best combination I have ever had for lasagna.
Equipment
- Dutch oven or a heavy bottomed pot for the best flavors.
- 9 x 13 glass baking dish (or dish of your choice, but note the proportions are for this size)
Ingredients
Ragu
- 1 lb ground beef
- 1 lb ground pork
- 3 yellow onions (500g)
- 2 stalks celery (100g)
- 2 medium carrots (100g)
- 10.6 oz double concentrated tomato paste (usually 2 tubes)
- 500 mL milk (whole fat, have extra incase sauce gets dry)
- 4 tbsp butter (55g)
- 4 bay leaves
- 1 tsp italian spices
- salt, pepper, cayenne pepper to taste
Béchamel
- 1/3 stick butter (80g)
- 1/3 cup flour (80g)
- 1 L milk (whole fat)
- whole nutmeg (grate straight into the sauce to taste. If you only have nutmeg that is ground, ~1/8 tsp)
- 1/4 lb freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano (the quality of this really is important!)
- salt and pepper to taste
Pasta
- 1 box lasagna noodles of your choice I have never used the oven ready kind and always boil mine for a bit, note the directions!
Instructions
Ragu
- Dice the onions, celery and carrots. Try to lean to a smaller size so they are more cohesive in the sauce.
- In a pan with a large circumference cook/brown the beef and pork. Make sure to break up all the pieces. The goal here is to cook off all the water and brown the meat. The meat should have a nice brown color at the end. Once brown, set aside.
- Place a dutch oven or heavy bottomed pot on medium heat and add the butter (55g) and brown it.
- Once the butter is brown add the onions, carrots and celery. Mix and cover the pot. You want to sweat the onions and also get rid of all the water in the vegetables. Once the onions and carrots look melted and sweated, you can add the meat in the pot.
- Add the two tubes of the tomato paste and mix. Add in the bay leaves as well as the salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper.
- Slowly add in 1/2 of the milk. Mix the sauce. The meat should absorb all the milk. Add the remaining milk and mix.
- Cover the pot, lower the heat to low, and simmer for about 1 hour. The longer you cook this the more cohesive the flavors will be.
- Check in on the sauce every so often and mix, if it looks a bit dry add more milk!
- When the sauce is almost done, you can start the noodles and béchamel.
Lasagna Noodles
- You can probably buy oven ready lasagna noodles, but I have never used those.
- While the ragu is cooking, I boil a pot of water with salt.
- Once the water comes to boil I add the lasagna noodles. I do about 4 layers of 4-5 lasagna sheets each for a total of about 16-20 sheets (so naturally I do at least 20, better be over than under). This is about 4/5 of a box. Feel free to add more layers if you have a deeper dish.
- Boil for 10 minutes.
- Remove off heat and quench the pasta. Keep the pasta in cold water so it doesn't stick, until you are ready to construct!
Béchamel
- Heat the butter in a dutch oven.
- Once the butter is melted, add the equivalent amount of flour and mix with a spatula. Continue mixing until the whole sauce is done.
- Cook off the flour smell (about 2-3 minutes).
- Take off of the heat (very important, will make sure you have no clumps!) and add a bit of the milk (enough to make it creamy). Use a whisk to break up the pieces and create a cream. If you didn't add enough milk on the first go, no worries just add a bit more and mix!
- Put the pot back on the heat and add the rest of the milk and mix. Alternate between the wooden spatula and the whisk. The whisk helps break up the small clumps if they form. 6) Use the smallest part of your grater to grate the nutmeg. I always do this part by eye, but add to taste. Now if you don't have the fresh nutmeg, replacing it with already ground nutmeg is fine. I think when I use ground nutmeg I put in 1/8 of a tsp or a 1/4 depending on what the sauce is for and what I like.
- The sauce should start bubbling and getting thick. Add the salt and pepper to taste (remember the Parmigiano Reggiano is also salty so under salting and adding more later is best). Once it gets thick add in 1/2 a cup of Parmigiano Reggiano cheese and take off the heat and construct the lasagna.
Construction
- Add a few dollops of the meat sauce and lightly cover the bottom of the glass dish. NOTE: As you are constructing try to remove the bay leaves from your sauce!
- Add a layer of the noodles.
- Add a few dollops of the meat sauce and spread over the noodles
- Then add a few dollops of the béchamel sauce and spread that over the top. This should be thin and it doesn't have to cover everything. The more you put here the more your layers will slide. Though, if you are refrigerating before serving, this is no issue.
- Sprinkle just a little Parmigiano Reggiano on top.
- Repeat step 2-5 until you have 4 noodle layers.
- On top of the 4th noodle layer, add a dollop of the meat sauce and spread it around (you might have a bit of the meat sauce left over, and that's okay!).
- Add the rest of the béchamel sauce to the top.
- Add the rest of the Parmigiano Reggiano, this will brown into a nice crust with some amazing cream under.
- Bake for 35-40 minutes. I like to put a baking sheet under the glass just incase some oil starts bubbling over. Less mess to clean!
- Take out of the oven and wait a few minutes for it to cool. Once it has slightly cooled you can cut in and enjoy!
Notes
NOTE: I only have one dutch oven, so I transfer the meat to another pot and have it continue cooking it until I finish with the béchamel because why not?
I LOVE this youtube guide for making béchamel. I copy her recipe and methods. Christine Cushing is amazing and this is the best béchamel I’ve ever had!
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