Is Lasagna the Food of the Gods?

a favorite comfort food and company dish

I ate a lot of Italian food as a kid, but I did not even know about lasagna until I hit college. At that point, a man I was dating took me to his favorite pizza joint and whispered, "Try their lasagna!" I loved it, and I've been a fan ever since. However, I'm a bit fussy. I like only good lasagna, one that has the proper proportions of meat, sauce, cheese, and pasta. I don't like any single ingredient to dominate, although I do think that having a good red sauce may be the most important single item.

I make lasagna only in the winter, and since it trashes the kitchen (a large pot for the noodles, a large pot for the red sauce, a pan to brown the meat, and several other bowls and utensils), I don't make it often. But I make a LOT of it, because it's as simple to make a lot as it is a little. You need many different ingredients, so just get large sizes and make several pans of it; lasagna freezes beautifully.

I think I make really good lasagna, so I'm sharing my tips:

• Use the noodles that you boil before baking. I know, it takes longer and is messier than using the no-boil noodles, but I think the results are far better. 
• Make a red sauce that very juicy.I start with a standard tomato sauce of some sort and then throw in a large can of stewed tomatoes that I chop up, This adds little pieces of tomato, which taste good, and keeps the sauce liquid enough so that it soaks into the pasta during baking. 
• Add a bit of meat to the red sauce. I usually add some ground turkey and a bit of Italian sausage, either pork-based or chicken-based.
• Add a package of frozen chopped spinach to the ricotta-egg-cheese mixture. It adds color, interest, and taste. 
• Use genuine ricotta and mozzarella cheese. Although I use part skim mozzarella, I use full-fat ricotta. 
• Don't over-bake. You want the top brown and the cheese melted, but you don't want the noodles dried out. If you freeze some, leave ample time for reheating from a frozen state; this food is dense. 

Although lasagna is a complete and balanced meal in itself, it is truly wonderful when served with a fresh green salad and fragrant garlic bread.

Youth Without Pasta

I never ate pasta as a youngster. "Pasta" did not exist as a food name. I ate noodles in chicken soup and in kugel; I ate macaroni with cheese; I ate spaghetti and meatballs; and that was about the extent of it. I never tried lasagna until I dated a man who loved the lasagna served at a restaurant near Amherst College. I never tasted homemade pasta until I joined a dinner group as an adult. And I avoided ravioli until recently, because I thought it was an invention of Chef Boyardee.

So many wasted years!

Although I still don't order pasta at restaurants (because I prefer to order complicated dishes that I don't usually eat), I have it often at home. This week, my daughter gave me some penne, chicken, and broccoli she had made.  A few days later, I made myself some chicken florentine ravioli with roasted tomato sauce. And last week I had fettuccine with shrimp, artichoke hearts, and peas.

These dishes have several features in common: they are relatively quick to make; they are inexpensive; they are very tasty and satisfying; they don't require a trip to the store for special ingredients. I always have something in my freezer or cupboard that I can pair with pasta. Also, pasta—like pizza—is a good way to use up odds and ends. Two mushrooms alone aren't good for much, but they make a great addition to most pasta sauces. So does a teaspoon of capers, or a few stalks of asparagus.

About once a month, I try some new pasta. Last month, it was Buitoni's Wild Mushroom Agnolotti. How bad could it be, I thought. Well, it was so good that I wrote them an unsolicited letter, extolling the virtues of this previously-unknown food. I had served it with a very simple tomato sauce plus some freshly grated Parmesan cheese. It tasted as if I had slaved over the stove for hours. I wished I had bought more than one package.

No one knows for sure how many different types of pasta exist. Some sources say 10; some say 150; one said 600. If the last number is true, I'm going to have years of experimenting. I can hardly wait.