I know that this recipe might never be made by the majority of readers, but if you are up for a bit of a challenge, you will be rewarded with one of the most delicate, delicious and dazzling pastas ever to pass your lips and make its way to your stomach. Every bite is a sublime ode to Marcella Hazan, the doyenne of Italian cuisine, who published this recipe in "The Classic Italian Cookbook." It all starts with her ragù Bolognese, which I've made in the past and served with rigatoni or over polenta. It's a long-simmering ragù that confounds what most Americans think of as spaghetti sauce since it contains no garlic, no basil, no oregano, no sausage. What it does have is milk (yes milk), white wine, nutmeg, tomatoes, olive oil, butter, onion, celery, carrots and ground meat of course. I posted the recipe before, with step-by-step photos here. But the recipe is also printed below. You can't ask for a tastier foundation for the lasagne.
You also can't make lasagne verdi without green pasta, so bring out your pasta machine, or put some elbow grease into rolling the pasta by hand. Yes, you can use store-bought pasta sheets, but I doubt you'll find green ones, and even if you do, there is nothing comparable to the silky toothiness of home-made lasagne noodles. Once you've tasted them, you'll see it's a game changer. To make the recipe less onerous, I made the ragù and pasta dough one day and refrigerated them, then rolled out the dough and assembled everything the next day.
You start out by spreading a little of the ragù in the pan, and then placing a layer of the pasta dough (which has been boiled for about 30 seconds) over the ragù. If necessary, cut the pasta strips to fit your pan.
Add more ragù, some of the béchamel sauce (sorry I didn't photograph making it), and spread it over the dough. Sprinkle with parmesan cheese (not pictured here).
Continue this procedure (pasta, ragù, béchamel, parmesan) until you run out of dough, ragù or béchamel (I was able to get six layers of pasta in the pan.)
Finish with a layer of pasta, béchamel, more parmesan cheese and a few pats of butter.
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Marcella Hazan’s Bolognese Ragù
Ingredients
2 tablespoons chopped yellow onion
3 tablespoons olive oil
3 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons chopped celery
2 tablespoons chopped carrot
3/4 pound ground lean beef (I used a combination of beef, veal and pork and it was slightly over one pound)
salt
1 cup dry white wine
1/2 cup whole milk
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
2 cups canned whole tomatoes, chopped, with their juice (I used a 28-ounce can of San Marzano tomatoes from Italy)
Instructions
In a Dutch oven or large heavy pot, add the onion with the oil and butter and saute briefly over medium heat until translucent.
Add the celery and carrot and cook for 2 minutes.
Add the ground meat, crumbling it in the pot with a fork.
Add 1 teaspoon salt, stir, and cook only until the meat has lost its red, raw color.
Add the wine, turn the heat up to medium high, and cook, stirring occasionally, until all the wine has evaporated.
Turn the heat down to medium, add the milk and the nutmeg, and cook until the milk has evaporated. This may take a while.
Stir frequently.
When the milk has evaporated, add the tomatoes and stir thoroughly.
When the tomatoes have started to bubble, turn the heat down until the sauce cooks at the laziest simmer, just an occasional bubble.
Cook, uncovered, for a minimum of 3 1/2 to 4 hours, stirring occasionally.
For the spinach pasta:
1/2 ten-ounce package frozen leaf spinach, thawed, or 1/2 pound fresh spinach (I misread the ingredients and used an entire 12-ounce bag of frozen spinach which worked out fine after I added more flour)
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups flour (because I goofed on adding more spinach than called for, I needed to add more flour to get the right consistency)
If using frozen spinach, cook it with 1/4 tsp. salt in a covered pan over medium heat for 5 minutes. Drain and let cool. If using fresh spinach, try to choose young, tender spinach. Remove all stems and discard any leaves that aren't perfectly green and crisp. Wash in a basin of cold water, changing the water several times until it shows no traces of soil. Cook with 1/4 teaspoon of salt in a covered pan over medium heat with just the water that clings to the leaves. Cook until tender, 15 minutes or more, then drain and allow to cool.
Squeeze the cook spinach with your hands as dry as you can, then chop it very fine. (I put it in a food processor to chop it).
You can make the pasta the traditional way by putting flour on a work surface, making a well in the center and lightly beating the eggs and spinach in the well, gradually adding the flour, but I placed the flour and eggs into the processor and mixed it all together in the machine until it gathered itself into a ball. I removed it from the food processor and added more flour by hand, kneading it until smooth. At this point, I wrapped it in plastic wrap and kept it in the refrigerator overnight. But you can let it rest for about 20 minutes and then proceed with the rest of the recipe.
For The Béchamel Sauce:
3 cups milk
6 tablespoons butter
4 1/2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
Melt the butter in a saucepan and add in the flour, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon. Let the flour and butter bubble for 2 minutes without ceasing to stir. Do not let the flour become colored.
Add the milk slowly over low heat, 1/4 cup at a time, stirring constantly with a whisk until it starts to thicken. Remove from heat and add the salt. It will thicken as it cools and will form a "skin," so it's best to make it right before you use it. If you have to reheat it, stir it vigorously over low heat and add more milk if necessary.
Other Ingredients:
2/3 cup parmesan cheese (I used about a cup)
2 tablespoons butter
Directions for Assembly:
Prepare the meat sauce.
Make the pasta:
Roll out sheets of pasta until not quite paper thin.
Boil the sheets in salted water for 30 seconds only and lay out to drain on clean dish cloths. (I boiled one sheet at a time to make it easier to manage)
Make the béchamel sauce.
Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
Smear the bottom of a lasagna pan with a bit of the meat sauce. Place a layer of the pasta over the sauce, cutting and overlapping strips slightly if necessary. Spread enough sauce on the pasta to dot it with meat, then spread bechamel over the meat sauce. sprinkle with grated parmesan cheese. Continue with more layers of pasta, ragù, béchamel and parmesan, ending with a layer of pasta. Coat the top layer with some béchamel, sprinkle with cheese and dot lightly with butter.
Bake on the uppermost rack of the oven for 10-15 minutes, until a light, golden crust forms on top. (If you made it ahead of time and refrigerated it, remove from refrigerator about 1 - 1/2 hour before baking to bring it to room temperature. I did that and still kept it in for about 25 minutes to make sure it was cooked through and had that golden crust and it was perfect)
Allow lasagne to settle 5-10 minutes before serving.
