We're making firehouse lasagna.
So we're grating a carrot for sugar.
That gives sweetness as does the onion.
Celery with the leafy tops.
So we're gonna start our meat sauce with that.
Garlic.
I pre-peel tons and tons of garlic
'cause we put it in everything, right?
Now, for the spice blend,
everybody can order it online if they want
but if you have a lot of spices at home,
it's such a great use up.
Then scrape up everything on the counter.
Ploop.
Ground fennel, fennel seed, fennel pollen.
Any of the above.
Pimenton to make it smoky 'cause it's firehouse inspired.
Oregano.
Okay?
And crushed red pepper if you're making meat sauce.
If you wanna turn this dish into chili, chili powder.
If you wanna turn this same recipe into chili,
add kidney beans or black beans or pinto beans
and you don't even need to do the carrot, celery and onions.
Just do onions and chili peppers or sweet peppers
or a mix of the two and garlic, period.
Back here, in smaller amounts, I do sage,
smoky cumin, a little grated nutmeg
and/or allspice and some thyme.
So you can mix all these dried spices.
You'll see the recipe online.
You can mix them all yourself and that's what's in here.
So once the carrots, celery and onions start to sweat,
we add the meat to the pan, a little salt and pepper,
over the shoulder for luck,
and let the color come off the meat.
You're not trying to brown it.
You're just trying to get the color off.
I have a fresh bay leaf in there.
You could use dry and we'll let that cook for a few minutes.
So now we're going to add our firehouse spice blend.
We're gonna put in the equivalent of a fat palmful, okay?
So one whole batch is about a third of a bottle
just so you know
and we're gonna stir that to bring out the aroma.
Now, we're gonna let this cook with a little tomato passata.
This is just pureed tomatoes.
You can use tomato sauce,
passata which is fresh tomatoes that are pureed
and I put some in the bottom of the pan.
Look in the bottom of the pan.
The bottom of our lasagna pan.
We put just plain tomato puree.
So now we're gonna add the rest of the bottle to our sauce
along with fire toasted tomatoes
'cause it's firefighter so we want it a little bit smoky.
15 ounces of fire roasted tomato
and a splash of red or white wine.
Just a splash.
Little drizzle around the pan.
And now we're gonna let this just thicken up a hair
and then we'll build the lasagna with our spinach.
Okay, three cups of ricotta cheese,
one cup of grated Parm cheese, two eggs.
This is our cheese and spinach layer.
One 16 ounce bag of spinach, guys,
defrosted from our freezer.
Greatest bargain in the grocery store.
Yum yum yum.
Wrung it out in a clean kitchen towel.
We add a little grated nutmeg.
Salt and pepper, white pepper.
So now we're gonna build the lasagna.
Again, this meat sauce is delicious by itself
just in a bowl of pasta, period.
You wanna turn it into chile?
Add chili powder to it of any heat level,
chili powder blend,
chipotle to make it extra smoky, extra spicy,
add in some beans and you have chili.
This is just flat lasagna.
You can make flat or curly, okay?
Who cares?
I parboil it for four minutes.
Now we're going to put in a layer of meat
and then what do you think comes next, John?
Maybe more pasta.
More pasta
and then our spinach and egg and ricotta.
You gotta be kidding me.
Yeah.
And then more pasta.
Yes.
It's gonna be three layers, guys.
Okay, now we've got the lasagna assembled
and now we're gonna top it with smoked mozzarella,
pepper Jack 'cause it's firehouse.
375 covered 40 minutes then uncovered till it turned brown.
Now we gotta let it stand a couple of minutes.
(applause)