Vegetable Lasagne

I won’t lie.  This dish takes a long time to prepare; it can’t be rustled up in 20 minutes.  In its defence however, you can prepare it in stages (- sometimes I cook the vegetables and/or the white sauce the day before I want the lasagne), it’s tasty comfort food, a great way to get your 5 a day(!) and once cooked, it can be kept in the fridge for a couple of days or frozen so you can do all the donkey work the day before you need it and then smugly deliver it to the table with no fuss!

You can buy fresh pasta sheets but I find that, although it is a lot more time consuming, I get better results with dried pasta which I then precook for 5 minutes as I’m assembling the lasagne.  Some of the dried pasta you can buy say you don’t need to pre-cook it but in my experience, if I don’t, I end up with very crunchy pasta layers.

Step 1:   The Vegetables

1. Preheat the oven to 190˚C fan (or 200˚C conventional).
2. Remove the ends of the courgettes, cut them in half lengthwise then each half in half again lengthwise then chop these lengths into pieces about 1.5cm wide.
   
3. Cut the “sides” of the peppers off and then dice these into about 1.5-2cm size.
   
4. Remove and discard the stem of the aubergines then slice the aubergines horizontally into slices about 1.5cm wide.  Dice each of these slices.
   
5. Put all the vegetables into a shallow roasting dish, drizzle over 2 1/2 Tablespoons of oil and sprinkle over the salt and give a good grind of pepper.  Then mix everything together well and put the dish in the oven for 30 minutes.  Give the veggies a good stir every 10 minutes or so to make sure they cook evenly.
   
6. Meanwhile, wash the spinach and put it into a large pot with a lid over a gentle heat.  Put the lid on and cook the spinach for 5-7 minutes.  The spinach should be wilted.  Drain the spinach in a colander.  Press the spinach against the holes with the back of a spoon to squeeze out as much water as possible. Leave the spinach to cool.  You can then use your hands to squeeze out even more water.
   

Step 2:  The White Sauce

1. Melt the butter in a small casserole dish or a large pot.  Stir in the flour and cook this over a gentle heat for 2 minutes.  This removes the floury taste from the white sauce but do make sure the heat isn’t too high or it will burn.  The mixture should look foamy.
   
2. While whisking, gradually add the milk.  Continue whisking or stirring while the sauce simmers gently for 15-20 minutes.  The sauce should be lump free and should thicken significantly.  Don’t walk away from the pot as it has a habit of boiling over if cooked over too high a heat or if left unattended.  You want a sauce that is thick but just pourable (like softly whipped cream). Season it with salt and pepper.  You can then put some clingfilm over the top of the sauce (touching the sauce and preventing any air getting to it) to prevent a “skin” forming over the sauce.
   

Step 3:  The Pasta and Assembly and Cooking

1. Preheat the oven to 200˚ C fan (210˚ C conventional)
2. Bring a large saucepan of water to the boil.  Put three sheets of pasta into the water and cook for 5 minutes then use these sheets to line the base of the dish. (I use a rectangular oven dish that measures 27cm x 21cm/10 1/2 inches x 8 1/4 inches).  Put another three sheets of pasta into the water for 5 minutes while you layer the lasagne.
   
3. Now layer the lasagne as follows (on top of the three sheets at the base of the dish)
   1. Half the roast vegetables
   2. Half the spinach
   3. Half the tin of chopped tomatoes
      
   4. 1/3 of the white sauce
      
   5. Second layer of pre-cooked pasta (now put the third and final lot of 3 sheets of pasta into the boiling water to cook).
      
   6. The remaining roast vegetables
   7. The remaining spinach
   8. The remaining chopped tomatoes
   9. 1/3 of the white sauce
   10. Third layer of pre-cooked pasta
       
   11. Final 1/3 of white sauce
4. Scatter over the grated cheese and put the lasagne into the oven for 30 minutes.
   
5. After 30 minutes the cheese should be melted and golden brown on the top.