Ditto this.
Cook’s Country used cottage cheese and heavy cream in their quick lasagna:
Brian
Around here, some people use cottage cheese :mad:
This is the single thing I do not listen to the folks at America’s Test Kitchen on. There is no way I’m putting cottage cheese in a lasagna. My Nana would never forgive me. Ricotta.
Last time I made lasagna, I “discovered” that putting the ricotta mixture into a pastry bag (well, technically a zip-lock bag with the end snipped off so it was pastry-bag-esque) and piping it out worked way better than trying to spread it with a spatula. Which never works.
Ricotta, but I’m not opposed to bechamel.
I am opposed to cottage cheese.
My mother would sometimes use cottage cheese instead of ricotta. It’s why I didn’t attend her funeral.
Ricotta. Only had the Béchamel once. It was at a very nice Italian restaurant. I was disappointed. I like my lasagna heavy and firm.
Same for manicotti and ravioli. Ricotta, with a few herbs in the cheese.
Made spaghetti from scratch yesterday. My Wife doesn’t see the difference between that and the boxed stuff. She’s away for the week, so it’s a special treat for me.
I love lasagna and I love small curd cottage cheese. But together? GAACKKKK.
Meat and ricotta please, with tomato sauce.
There is nothing, NOTHING, more disappointing than ordering the lasagna at a new restaurant and getting a bechamel version. Ugh :mad:. Now I make sure to ask.
Bechamel lasagna is of the devil.
It’s not the single thing (there are several), but I’m in agreement. I do look for ricotta with no thickeners (xantham gum, etc.). Just milk, vinegar, salt. If I plan in advance, I’ll even strain it.
take the small (or large) curd cottage cheese and plus it in a food processor…instant fake ricotta. and just as good…smooth it out !!
I’m a bad Italian-descended American because I didn’t even know bechamel was a lasagne thing until a few years ago. Ricotta all the way. Although the bechamel intrigues me. Sometimes a ricotta one gets too dried out and crunchy. Any frozen lasagne or chain restaurants offer a bechamel one that I could try a small portion of? If I made a whole tray of it and it sucked, I would hate to throw it away. And as I’ve never encountered it in a restaurant, I don’t know think I’d find it in one of my local Italian places.
I don’t think I’ve even had bechamel in a lasagna. I’ve made it both with ricotta and a ricotta/cottage cheese mix.
We used to have a poster that occasionally posted recipies as the angry chef that were hilarious. His lasagna was the best I’ve had. The last couple of times I’ve searched for it I couldn’t find it any more.
I just googled it again and it was ** RickJay ** I really want him to write a cookbook.
So I think the difference, broadly speaking, is a north-south divide. Southern Italian and Sicilian families are more likely to make lasagne with ricotta, and were also more likely to immigrate to the USA. Northern Italians favour the besciamella style, and made up a greater proportion of European migrants to the UK and Australia. (Similarly, the earlier wave of Italian migration to the US happened before the invention of the espresso machine, so these families opened diners and served drip coffee. The later immigrants took their taste for espresso with them, and the delightful cafe culture of Melbourne is the result.)
I have served my besciamella bolognese lasagne to lots of Americans, many of whom have never tried it before, to great acclaim.
I don’t, as a rule, like bechamel sauce. It’s, fine I guess, but bland and vaguely like eating warm mayo. Ricotta for me.
Right, like this.
It also is a great trick for manicotti.
No lasagna sucks, bechamel, ricotta, or filled with whatever craziness you want to fill it with.
That said, I didn’t think I liked lasagna much until I found the Simili Sisters’ recipe for it in an old issue of Saveur c. 2000. Here’s a recipe for their excellent bolognese, which is one component of it. The whole recipe and story can be found here (site says 2008, but the original recipe was published in '99 or '00), but the site is not adblocker friendly, and the recipe is broken up into four parts (one for the spinach lasagna, one for the besciamella, one for the bolognese, and one for the the constructed lasagna.) The first time I made this recipe, my taste buds and my girlfriend’s tastebuds were just blown. I just could not believe how something so simple (but time consuming) can be. Just concentrated flavors of beef and creamy, parmesan-y umami. I swear to god that first lasagna I made was the best dish I ever made in my life. I haven’t been able to perfectly recreate it since – I was living in Hungary at the time, so the beef was a bit different, and perhaps even the parmesan I used was different (actually, I remember I subbed a grana padano), but holy shit, just that bolognese was so concentrated and de-fucking-licious. My SO and I at the time just could not stop eating it straight from the pot.
My mother’s family came from Naples and I’ve never had a version cooked for me that didn’t use ricotta (pronounced with the New York Italian dialect).
I voted “both”, but then remembered I’m much more likely to use a Mornay sauce than a plain besciamella .
But spinach noodles, always.