The food lab better home cooking through science ( PDFDrive ) 913

“What are you doing at two in the morning?!” she asked in her I’m-not-really-yelling-but-I-am-in-my-head voice “Um .” I stammered “Uh .” I knew she’d never believe me if I told her the truth, so I decided to use my previously successful tactic of offering her an excuse before I offered an explanation “I couldn’t sleep!” That should satisfy her curiosity “Yes, but what are you doing, and why are you making so much noise, and why does it smell like béchamel and creamed spinach in here?” “Well , I couldn’t sleep so I decided to make a lasagna.” She stared at me blankly for a moment, then turned around and shuffled back to the bedroom, muttering, “What did I marry?” under her breath IF SHE had given me a longer chance to explain, I would have been able to foist the blame squarely on the shoulders of Serious Eats community member KarmaFreeCooking She’d started up a “Talk” thread titled “Vegetarian Lasagna Throwdown—Ideas to Win over Any Meat Eater,” explaining that she’d been issued the challenge of bringing a vegetarian lasagna good enough to compete with a meaty one to a lasagna party I was not invited to this party, nor was I officially challenged, but, challenge accepted The Layers I started with a base of lightly creamed spinach I considered going the easy route with frozen leaves, but figured that if the ultimate version is what we were after, and we were already putting in the not-insignificant amount of work required to construct a lasagna, using fresh spinach was not asking too much Some spinach lasagnas have you blanch the leaves in boiling water, then wring out the excess Far easier is to just wilt them in a pot along with some sautéed garlic and olive oil From there, a hit of heavy cream and a grating of nutmeg is all they need Ricotta is a classic ingredient in an Italian-American lasagna, but I find the texture to be grainy and bland once cooked (mostly because store-bought ricotta just stinks) Instead, I use a trick I learned from Cook’s Illustrated : replace the ricotta with some whole-fat cottage cheese pulsed in the food processor It stays moist during baking and adds great tang to the finished dish So I added the pulsed cottage cheese along with some chopped parsley and an egg to the spinach layer For the mushrooms, I made a classic duxelles by cooking chopped button mushrooms (you can also use cremini or shiitake) down with butter, shallots, thyme, and heavy cream A dash of soy sauce added some meaty depth to them, while lemon juice brightened things up Finally, a besciamella bound the whole thing together As with my lasagna Bolognese, using no-boil noodles presoaked in warm water save you the trouble of having to parcook the noodles And, dear wife, I hope you like the results, because it’s gonna be your lunch and dinner for the next four days  ... lasagnas have you blanch the leaves in boiling water, then wring out the excess Far easier is to just wilt them in a pot along with some sautéed garlic and olive oil From there, a hit of heavy cream and a... Illustrated : replace the ricotta with some whole-fat cottage cheese pulsed in the food processor It stays moist during baking and adds great tang to the finished dish So I added the pulsed cottage cheese along with some chopped parsley and... pulsed cottage cheese along with some chopped parsley and an egg to the spinach layer For the mushrooms, I made a classic duxelles by cooking chopped button mushrooms (you can also use cremini or shiitake) down with