#lasagne

I started making my traditional Christmas lasagne so it'll be ready for Christmas. I started by making the marinara sauce. I use Cento tomatoes because they come from the very fertile San Marzano valley of Italy and they are the sweetest, most delightful tomatoes with which to make a sauce!! I use a lot of vegetables, too. I add onions, mushrooms, minced garlic, and green and red peppers. I always add Italian cheese rinds to my sauce because I love the flavor it imparts. This time I used parmesan reggiano and a little pecorino romano. I add bay leaves, basil, oregano, garlic powder (I love garlic), salt and pepper. Sometimes, I add other spices to my sauce, but these are the ones I use for lasagne.

First, I sauté the chopped onions. I use extra virgin olive oil to sauté everything because it's tasty and healthy. Once they're translucent, I add the mushrooms. I always make sure that they're dry so they'll brown nicely. I salt both of these veggies as they cook to release their natural juices, which makes the sauce so tasty!!

Then, I add the garlic. After it is cooked a bit, I add the peppers. I don't cook them very long because the garlic will become bitter and I want the peppers to retain their crunchy texture. I cook the peppers just long enough to bring out their beautiful colors. Then I mix it all together and add the spices. I sauté then for a minute and add the sauce and the cheese rinds.

Okay, starting with two onions (cos that's all the onions I have apparently). Chop and fry

I also decided here that I wanted a bit more body in it, so I started soaking some lentils to get them ready.

For those that don't know, dry lentils are easy to use, cheaper, and last longer in storage. Give it ten or fifteen min in hot water, changing the hot water every minute or two. I think these took six changes of water. You gotta stir it a bit to kick up the gross. It's ready once the stir doesn't make the water super cloudy. But yeah, not much effort really, and takes as much time to prep as cooking onions, so you don't need to plan it. Chickpeas take longer, you need to plan those

I also unstacked and restacked the dishwasher between doing the lentils

Chopped up my 500g of mushrooms. Very rough chopping, they'll cook. Bunged the lentils in and decided I'd had enough of the kitchen for a bit. So that's cooking down in the kitchen while I take a break on the couch