Sunday, June 13, 2010

I was in a good mood today and made myself yummy lasagna for lunch. And since I got nothing better to do, I decided to share with you my recipe. Chey, recipe some more okay! Don't play play. I'm like the iron chef. wtf.

Okay here's what you need:

1) Garlic - chopped into tiny pieces

2) Chilli sauce and tomato sauce (must be maggi brand! Will tell you why later)

3) Tomata paste - this one can be any brand, I chose the cheapest one. Cheapskate I know.

4) Lasagna - duh.

5) Minced meat

6) Chicken broth

7) Onion - diced

8) An aluminium box thing (I show you picture later)

9) Lots and lots of cheese!

That's all! Than you can start already.

First thing first, season your minced meat! Put it in a bowl and add MSG, light soy sauce, sesame oil, pepper and corn flour. This will make the minced meat super delicious, the sesame oil provide the fragrance and the corn flour will help tenderize the meat! Geesh, I really sound like I know what I'm doing. Whoo!

Once you're done, put it aside.

Now prepare a flying I mean frying pan and heat up some oil.

Pour in the chopped garlic and stir fly it until it's slightly brown and you can smell the aroma of the garlic. Which usually takes less than a minute. You have to keep stirring okay, the garlic turn from brown to black super fast.

And the reason why my photo is blurred is because I was stirring halfway when I decided to do this post so I ran into my room, rampage through my table to find my camera and than ran back to the kitchen than faster snap a photo cause my garlic going to turn black already. T___T

Next, pour in the onions and stir fry it. I like to cook the onion until it's abit brown cause it taste sweeter. :D Anyway, when you can see that the onion is abit soft, pour in the minced meat.

This prolly takes a while cause you want the meat to be fully cooked through. Yes, I know it's going to go into the oven anyway but I just like it very fully cooked. >: ( anal. lol.

So now you stand there like an idiot feeling very hungry and keep stirring and stirring until the meat is slightly browned.

Than you pour in about 1 cup to 1 and a half cup of chicken broth. Or if you're lazy, than just use plain water lah. Tsk. Anyway, remember that it is supposed to be quite watery. Reason is that you're not going to precook the pasta. So this sauce you're preparing is what's actually cooking the pasta. I will talk more about it later.

Stir in about 3 teaspoon of tomato paste. No need care about the brand, they all taste the same to me. so Just choose the cheapest one on the shelf.

Now pour in roughly 6 table spoon of chilli sauce and tomato sauce each. No, don't worry, it's not spicy AT ALL. I swear, even kids can eat this. The spicy level is like neg 10. Really, somehow the chilli sauce don't work one. But you have to put in both tomato sauce and chilli sauce. It taste good.

And I repeat, HAVE TO BE MAGGI. I tried other brands but it's just not nice. Maggi's is sweet and just.. just.. just nice lah!

Stir well and let it simmer abit. If the sauce is too thick, add in more chicken broth. Okay, this photo very misleading. Somehow my camera make it look like it's tom yam spicy red. In reality, it's more of a dull tomato sauce colour. T.T

And really!! Not spicy one! So those of you who cannot take spicy things confirm can handle this one.

And your sauce is done! YAY! But this time you should be starving already. So I recommend cooking this when you just start to feel a little hungry.

There, this is the aluminium box thing I was talking about. You need this because you'll need to sort of stack the lasagna and this is perfect to hold it together ... if it makes sense.

Nevermind, come I show you.

First, you put a 'layer' of the meat and sauce you prepare. Make sure the sauce cover the whole bottom! Remember, the pasta need all this sauce to cook!

This is a box of lasagna pasta if you have no idea. =.= lol, sorry if I insulted your intelligence.

Now place a piece of lasagna on top of the sauce like this. See the box is just nice for lasagna cause help holds all the layers in place. Smart right...

Now you put a layer of sauce followed by cheese. I don't really like my lasagna with too much cheese so just put a little. If you like cheese, you can put more. Now make sure you cover the entire pasta with the sauce!

See, uncooked pasta is very dry. So when all this layers is done, we're going to pop it into the oven and let the pasta cook. So in order for the pasta to become soft and edible, it will absorb all the moisture from the sauce. Therefore, if you don't have enough sauce or puts too little, the pasta will not be able to cook properly. That's why I kept emphasizing on making more sauce!

Wow, I sound so professional!

Okay, basically you continue to layer it. Sauce than cheese than pasta than sauce than cheese and blah blah. Until it reaches the top or there's no more sauce.

Make sure you end with the sauce on top okay! Now add another layer of cheese for the top crust. Okay, I like my pasta not very well done that's why I straight away put the cheese on top. If you like your pasta very well cooked, you can pop this into the oven, cook it for 5 to 10 minutes before putting the cheese.

This way your cheese won't burn before your pasta is done.

Pop it into the oven and bake it for about 10 to 15 minutes at 180 degree. You notice I put mine on the lowest level so that it takes longer for the cheese to cook. This way my pasta gets to spend more time in the oven. Hoho.

While waiting, you can go browse my other entries. Cheyyyy.

I like my cheese very crispy so I let it bake a little longer. And.. TADAH!! You got delicious lasagna for lunch! (:

P.S This is just MY way of making lasagna, I didn't refer to any cookbook or learn from anyone. I just er.. I duno I just know to do it like that. I don't know why. But I must say first, I'm not saying this is the only way or the correct way okay? Don't come find me if you burn down your kitchen ah!