The love of my life doesn’t cook often, but when she does, she batch-cooks the most wonderful and comforting soups, stews and bolognese. She’ll often cook a vat of bolognese in the pressure cooker to serve with pasta, upcycle into chilli (by adding beans and cayenne), or to make lasagne. Like many stewed and baked dishes, lasagne tastes even better the next day, either reheated or (my favourite) enjoyed cold in a slab as a snack. For the ultimate treat, however, try deep-frying the leftovers, because the umami-rich insides turn extra-gooey, and create the most marvellous juxtaposition of textures against the crunchy crust. The lasagne needs to be at least partially frozen to breadcrumb it, so keep your leftovers in the freezer, to deep-fry as and when required.
Deep-fried lasagne
There’s not much more delicious than lasagne, except maybe deep-fried lasagne. Everything is delicious fried, not least because it creates incredible textures, and satisfies the primal desire for fat and energy, all of which help make fried food so wonderfully comforting.
At home, we like to batch-cook three large lasagnes at a time, then have one for dinner, one for the fridge for later in the week and one for the freezer. That way, we usually have some leftover lasagne in the freezer to deep-fry at some point when we feel like a real treat.
Serves 2-4
1 small frozen homemade lasagne (about 400g)
Oil, for frying
4-8 tbsp plain flour
1 egg, beaten
4-8 tbsp breadcrumbs
Defrost the lasagne for 30 minutes to an hour, until it’s soft enough to cut into four squares, and heat the oven to 200C (180C fan)/gas 6.
Fill a saucepan big enough to hold all four pieces of lasagne at once with 1-2cm of frying oil and put on a medium heat.
Keeping an eye on the oil, put the plain flour in a small bowl, the beaten egg in a second bowl and the breadcrumbs in a third bowl. Dredge each block of lasagne in the flour to coat, then dip it in the egg and finally turn in the breadcrumbs to cover.
When the oil is hot but not smoking, carefully lower in the lasagne pieces one by one, then fry for about five minutes, turning occasionally, until golden brown all over. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the fried lasagne to an oven tray and bake for 15 minutes, until hot right through.
