Lasagna to make an Italian grandmother proud: Alex Guarnaschelli shares her family recipe
When it comes to lasagna, you get what you give. And that’s what makes it the perfect dish to serve to loved ones, especially around the holidays.
Maybe it’s the nostalgia of the closing year, or maybe it’s that as an Old Millennial, I’ve heard New Radicals’ “You Get What You Give” too many times, but when I started thinking about making a lasagna, I kept coming back to the thought that it is an expression of love.
It’s not exactly hard to make, but it takes effort. There are a lot of steps, and halfway in amid the kitchen mess, you may find yourself overwhelmed. But that satisfied feeling of taking a beautiful, bubbly lasagna out of the oven is only surpassed by the joy of sharing it.
Alex Guarnaschelli writes of the “painstaking trouble” of making lasagna like her grandma. Her family recipe, which she included in her cookbook “The Home Cook: Recipes to Know by Heart,” features 40 hand-rolled meatballs and layers of San Marzano tomato sauce, mozzarella, ricotta and freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheeses.
“There is something about getting a bite of beef in a little meatball and then the burst of flavor from the tomato sauce that makes this dish even more delicious,” she writes.
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