Lasagna | Italian Origins, Ingredients, Cooking Styles, & Types (2024)

FAQs

What is the origin of lasagna? ›

Lasagna first made is a grand entrance in Naples, Italy during the Middle Ages in the 14th century. Initially, this dish was reserved for special events and holidays. Ironically, this pleasure inducing food was introduced to Italians in the middle of the Black Plague.

The primary differences I found between American lasagne and Italian lasagne were: The use of a layer or two of white bechamel (“"besciamella”) sauce imparts a nice creaminess to the lasagne in Italy. The pasta sheets seemed thinner and “fresher” in Italian pasta, very tender and with a “"melt in your mouth” texture.

The first theory is that lasagna comes from Greek λάγανον (laganon), a flat sheet of pasta dough cut into strips. The word λαγάνα (lagana) is still used in Greek to mean a flat thin type of unleavened bread baked for the holiday Clean Monday.

Lasagna is an American spelling. Lasagne is a British spelling.

A traditional lasagne is not made with other vegetables and is always made with tomato sauce. It's generally a mix of besciamella, ragù, lasagna sheets and occasionally mozzarella, sausage or even eggs. In Italy it's also famous a white version of lasagna with peas, besciamella and champignon mushrooms.

Several food companies offer halal processed foods and products, including halal foie gras, spring rolls, chicken nuggets, ravioli, lasagna, pizza and baby food. Halal ready meals are a growing consumer market for Muslims in Britain and America and are offered by an increasing number of retailers.

The key to creating the absolute best lasagna is to use a combination of ricotta and cottage cheese. Ricotta brings the rich creaminess while cottage cheese lightens things up and seasons the whole dish. For even more cheese, we recommend also using shredded Mozzarella cheese and Parmesan cheese (or Pecorino Romano).

In southern Italy lasagna is generally made with dried sheets of pasta layered with rich meat ragú, ricotta and mozzarella. In the north, especially in Bologna, the most popular version of lasagna features fresh egg pasta colored green with spinach and layered with ragú, bechamel and Parmigiano Reggiano.

But some still firmly believe ricotta is the way to go. It's lighter in texture than a béchamel and can offset the richness of the meat sauce and mozzarella. The question even divided our team of food editors. For many of us, ricotta-based lasagna offers cozy nostalgia.

lasagna, pasta dish of Italian origin, made with broad often ruffled noodles and a tomato or white sauce. Lasagna, in the singular, is a southern Italian variation of what northern Italians call lasagne, in the plural.

Is lasagna healthy for you? ›

Lasagna is a comfort-food staple, but it can be trouble if you're not careful. Like many favorites with lots of ingredients, a cheese-laden lasagna can be overloaded with things like saturated fats. A meatless lasagna, one with vegetables, is healthier. Go with low-fat or fat-free cheese, too.

Generally, lasagna has about 3 or 4 layers of pasta, with sauce, ricotta cheese, mozzarella, béchamel, and sometimes meat or even meatballs or sausage between those layers.

A thin sauce runs right off of cooked lasagna noodles, causing all the layers to slide off of each other, as well. A thick sauce, meanwhile, almost acts like a glue that holds the layers together, resulting in a dish that slices into neat squares.

In the Italian language, lasagna is singular; lasagne is plural. In English, we normally just add an "s" to make a word plural. In Italian, nouns and adjectives are designated as masculine or feminine. The plural for lasagna, a feminine noun, changes the "a" to "e".

Lasagna may have had its roots in Greece and its first incarnations in Britain, but it's the dish's popularity in Italy that helped it to truly develop. During the 16th century, Italian people were crazy about lasagna, and incorporated it into both sweet and savory dishes as needed.

The green of the lasagne was originally from nettles, but now spinach is used.” Facchini's version was superb, the layers thin and artfully cut, the melding of ragù and besciamella consistent, and the topping crisp and fragrant with Parmigiano.

Lasagna in America is most often made of several layers of pasta with cheese and tomato sauce, baked in the oven. American lasagna recipes do include some variations on these fillings, like white lasagna that eliminates tomato sauce in favor of extra cheese, or adds spinach and artichoke hearts.

Something which could be called lasagne in the modern sense had appeared in Italy by the 13th century. The earliest recipe book in the Western world is the fourth-century De Re Coquinaria by Apicius, which contains about 500 Roman recipes, including lagana. The King's recipe book is the first to be written in English.