Don’t Be Offended by Julia Child’s Lasagna

on the menu today is Julia Child's

lasagna

, wait, that's Bon, that's right, we have Julia's interpretation of

lasagna

Al Franz in The French Manor, she has to say ala Franz there so she can try to get her way, huh, but you go to find this recipe in Julia Child's Kitchen The Cookbook oh hello everyone, welcome to my house, what's yours for next moment? Couldn't you have predicted the wrath of YouTube comments that comes with venturing into Italian cuisine? Julia, uh, but yeah, she did. I got a lot of hate for this recipe in the past, it was looked down upon.

What do you mean by using our national dish lasagna for leftovers? The very idea bothered me. An angry person said. Is right. The recipe is a vehicle for leftovers. She is very clear about it. and they called her a hedonistic and ignorant insult for that reason I have also been called those things so we are twins we are twins now the recipe of course has pasta and red tomato sauce and white sauce and there is cheese Of course, there is also a kind of mystery meat like you choose what kind of meat you want to add in there with green vegetables that you also choose and she even mutters the word Cottage cheese, I don't know, but cottage cheese, yes.

Anyway, I don't know, this is giving me the same vibes as your moussaka recipe, which is like you have to throw those preconceived notions of what a lasagna is out the window and you just have to accept it, so bear with me. Keep in mind, let's go. To work now, this lasagna recipe exists because Julia is imagining that you know company is coming, you need to make something quick, how about lasagna? So she's using store-bought curly lasagna pasta. If she wasn't filming, maybe I'd go that route, but I like to make things difficult and I like to give myself more work, so I'm going to make my own pasta.

I made it last year from this cookbook. Marchella Hazan for another legend and the essentials of classic Italian cuisine. I have experience. with the pasta recipes in this cookbook so I guess make your own pasta today Jamie don't be lazy on the surface here I have double zero flour this is a cup and 3/4 or 200g although I'm using three eggs. The Internet says that 100 G of flour is used for each egg. Well, I'm using 200g because I'm following Marella's recipe, so I have an extra 100g on standby if I need it and I'm going to add my three eggs in a little well here, add the eggs with a fork like you're making a tortilla and keep the flour wall strong, move the flow walls in with the eggs, we have leaks, if it starts leaking like that then just keep going Don't worry about the mess it's okay so now just move the flour in the eggs, so I just need that combined kneading, all this together, bend my fingers there and with the heel of my palm pushing the dough forward, fold the dough. in half and then turn it half over and then continue doing what she says for about 8 minutes since the dough is a little wet.

I'm going to throw in a little more flour, press my thumb into the dough and if it comes out clean and made into a smooth ball, I'm going to chill it for half an hour because I have all these other things I have to do too, so Julia was preparing this with food that was already made like I said, it's a leftover dish for her for me uh, I have to make everything from scratch. I have no leftovers in the refrigerator, other than a pancake pie that won't be of much use to us right now, two or three cups of chicken, cooked and diced turkey. or pork, whatever you have in the fridge, that's what you use, that's all it says, so you're good now on her TV show, Julia mentions that she's using chicken simmered in white wine and I I did. recipe before she is out of the way to cook cookbook.

I'm going to cut this chicken into quarters and then we're going to cut half of each quarter. That's it, season our chicken with salt and pepper, then I put my thing down, turn it over and invert it and let's season it some more. I hope everyone is doing well, so I'll start with the pot. I have a couple of carrots, the tender part of a giant ass leak and four celery broths, all very coarsely Julian and I'm going to add a third of these vegetables, now I'm going to add a little salt, pepper, no butter, 4 teaspoons of Dried Teragon and everyone's favorite bay leaves, well I only need to use one, there it is, I just can't help it, it's two.

We'll be walking tonight, so let's place the chicken pieces on top of our bed of vegetables. We cover the chicken with the rest of the vegetables. About 2 cups of chicken broth. The rest will be a dry white wine. This is a Blan y es. to barely cover the chicken is enough for one glass and while you're drinking it, if you bring it to a simmer that would be great, cover it, turn it down but keep it simmering until the chicken is completely cooked, so 20 30 minutes. and keep an eye on it so that it's ready when it's tender, yeah, and when you poke it with a fork, the juice runs clear, turn off the heat at the perfect time, turn off the heat and I'm going to let it sit in the liquid for about 15 minutes or until until it's ready, honestly, until it's ready, so we should move on to this great tomato sauce or, as Julie always says tomato sauce, she likes to say tomato, I say tomato, big onion, this is a big one in Julia was using a large onion on her show, so I said, "Okay, I need a large onion finely chopped or as finely chopped as you want to chop these.

Bowl, thank you, so today I'm going to do something a little different." She says you need three large tomatoes, so I also bought an extra small one. Usually I have a pan of water boiling on the stove and then I dunk them in that boiling water, but this time I say, why don't you bring them? the water to the tomatoes, so it's boiling and I'm going to let those tomatoes soak in there for 10 seconds, the skin peels off easily and it's perfect. I'm going to split these tomatoes in half crosswise, scoop out the seeds in the juice, honestly. this step I hate this step cut once cut twice avoid the stem because you forgot to cut it I don't want the stem to cross and then cut again a full can of Italian plum tomatoes I need to drain the canned tomatoes and save about one cup of pulp in it, so first i need to drain, what am i doing?

I drain the canned tomatoes so I am very confused by the logic of removing all the seeds from the fresh tomatoes and then I add the canned tomatoes and they all have seeds. on them and I remember that on her show she passes the canned tomatoes through a meal. I don't really understand what's going on, honestly, I don't know, she never washed her own dishes, so she could just do all this stuff. I'm going to need about a cup of saucepan which is one of my favorites and we're going to heat up 2 tablespoons of olive oil adding a cup of chopped onion that's about a cup okay so we're looking for a soft one. but it doesn't look brown, it will be 6 to 8 minutes or so on medium heat, so keep stirring occasionally.

Keep it up. I have never come across such confusing instructions on how to make a tomato sauce before making one each week and I just fly away. It comes out great every time, but with Julia she tells me to remove about half the onions and save them for later. In the fresh tomato pulp we are going to add the garlic in this step now instead of the next one as Julia says. because I think they should be involved in the process now, you know, cook with what's going on right now here, just run them through the little contraption and that's it, I turn the heat down to medium low and let them cook for a few minutes half a teaspoon of Italian seasoning a big pinch of saffron threads a little dried orange peel home style I was eating an orange before and then I left this orange peel drying in the sun and that's it I only need 1/4 teaspoon let's lightly coat those canned tomatoes along with the pepper and salt and simmer for at least 30 minutes and if it thickens then I have a little bit of tomato juice that I can add in there so let's circle back to the pasta I call up the Chromo Alfredo the pasta machine it's good to see you okay so with the firmed pizza dough it's not pizza dough with our firmed pasta dough here divide it into I'm thinking of six different pieces, right?

I just have like yeah, just a little bowl, thank you that way, I can cover those pieces, fold once and twice towards the center, there, in that little shape. The pasta machine flourishes there, of course. Pasta Pasta with the adjustments go lengthwise down and then I do a Widthwise I always like to do the next step widthwise adjusting the notches to be a little thinner with each pass until I get to the desired length. I'm looking for the thinnest setting which is notch nine, so although I'm following Marchal's recipe here, uh. I want what Julia's asking for here: 2 x 12 split, halved and halved go the uneven tips and then it should be a great bunch of different mushrooms here, whole, sliced ​​and I'm just going to dice them. all in about 2 cups, if they have been cleaned of course, all she says is to dice them, so do it in a way that is acceptable for a lasagna, so make a courtesy cut in my pan 2 tablespoons of butter tablespoon of oil when the butter foam begins to subside, move the mushrooms and shake for 4 to 5 minutes, the mushrooms will absorb that fat at first they will look a little dry and then in a few minutes it will magically reappear on the surface out of the fire. so gather around everyone, this is what's about to happen.

I have my beautiful H lasagna noodles that have been hanging on the shelf for the last half hour or so on the tree waiting for their moment. They look cute. They look good, you know, they're not completely uniform, but I'll make it all work in the end, so it's not a big deal. I have to boil them according to Per Mar Ella's recommendation, so I will infuse them with a little salt. she's going to get the cooking started, good for me Richard. I have a pot of boiling water and I'm going to add a bunch of tablespoons of salt or two once it's about to boil, the lasagna noodles only last 10 seconds. do a few at a time man okay 10 20 seconds really depends on where you were in the pot if you're at the bottom it could be 30 40 seconds in the cold water Marchella says hand rings them in the sink Like if you're washing clothes, place them gently on this towel, wow, that one's a little torn, oh no, they're all torn, no, that one looks good, that one looks good, pat dry, can I have a colander?

Thank you, now we return to Julia. territory and Julia wants me to hang them dry in the colander like this and I have them hanging like this and then there, so we're going to move on to our spinach here, so I have about eight or 10 cups of raw spinach. here and I only need two cups of cooked spinach. It's always surprising to see how much of this is cooked into something so small. My frying pan here, my frying pan. I'm going to add 2 tablespoons of butter over medium high heat. butter packaging a b melt the butter inside goes the spinach keep stirring for a few minutes cover it so it can cook until the moisture has evaporated add a little salt pepper a pinch of nutmeg okay that's good turn off the heat, believe it or not, we poached chicken and white wine, it seems like it was about I don't know, a week ago first, let's peel this chicken.

It falls off the bone, it's beautiful, it's really good, it dices the chicken. I have followed this. recipe before but it's never tasted this good, there's a lot of flavor in this quick chicken bowl, thanks once it's diced but I don't know, it's great in a different setting here, if you weren't making lasagna, You could save the vegetables and serve them over steamed rice with the chicken and the chicken juice or just like I could turn this degassed one that she has returned, that's it, let's bring in the cooked spinach. You should have about 2 cups, I'd say they're pretty close to that knife.

It's got chicken all over it, quickly chop up the spinach, oh that's just a cup of cooked spinach, okay, I'm just going to make a little more spinach if you don't mind, it turns out that 8 to 10 cups of raw spinach is equivalent to one. cup cooked spinach I'm not even mad, it's amazing, right? So let's do the same. You don't need to see me do this. You understand. Here are the mushrooms that you are going to spill everywhere. I should also mention that I also cooked some more mushrooms because I didn't think I had enough. I didn't tell you I didn't think I was going to do it and then I said, you know what?

Just to be honest, I try my best with these recipes to make sure I have everything Julia wants me to have, including the cheese options, she said you could choose from one or all of them. I thought, oh what the hell let's all three do, this is guda provolone. and of course parmesan, so I only need one cup. I just need a cup. Silly boy, I think I'm going to do a little extra perm. Did I hand you the big three provolone gouda parmesan? You have more ingredients every time I check the refrigerator. This time I bring something new: we have some rotta, while the Italians say rotten.

I don't know, we have some ricotta, we have ricotta, so I remember when at the beginning of thisvideo I said that Julia Julia uses the dreaded cabin words. cheese in this recipe, she only does it because when this cookbook was written, she assumed that it wasn't that easy to find something like ricotta in the store because this book was written for American American cooks and you know, maybe something like ricotta. in the 7's, 80's or 1975 it wouldn't have been so easy to find something like ricot, so she said: yeah, buy some cottage cheese instead, it's a good substitute, well, I don't need to do that because I have ricotta here and I'm also thinking. about the cottage cheese in my lasagna makes me feel good.

I just take like a bowl, another bowl, thank you, he says, about half a cup per cup of ricotta cotta cheese, uh, I'm going to use a cup, so I'm adding an egg with the ricotta, why do you ask? But there is a reason behind it. I was reading a YouTube comment, not on my channel but on Julia Child's channel. Well, she's not alive anymore, but she has a YouTube channel and the lasagna episode. she's on that channel and someone in the comments said well if you're going to use a ricotta mixture in an egg because then it will be more structured and hold its shape when you bake it.

Wow, okay, good advice, okay, we have to do one more. It's an onion sauce with white wine, we need a lot. Four cups. It's the white sauce. Two saucepans. Three cups of whole milk. You're going to take your lactate today, right, Jamie, and then it says milk plus chicken broth, so I have a cup. of chicken broth mix it with the milk. Not only did she heat up the reserved onions that she was saving when she was making the tomato sauce. I have half of whatever there is along with 6 tablespoons of butter over moderate heat. blend the onions in the butter, the butter is bubbling, it goes 8 tablespoons of flour that is 60 G and it is the spinach, yes, we don't want you to cook that with the butter for 2 minutes, turn off the heat and add 2/3 of this hot.

Mix the milk no more than that, you see correctly. I'm using a metal whisk. I know from experience that this can handle it. Do not worry, thanks. However, mix in a little more milk. I only need to keep about half a cup. worth 1/3 cup of dry white wine or vermouth, this is vermouth, all ready, over moderately high heat again, it has a lot of wine flavor, so I think I'm going to add a little more milk stirring vigorously and bring it to to a boil you just have to make sure it covers the back of a spoon, no problem.

All season, here goes the salt, you can use white pepper if you're smart, if you're not smart, use black pepper, turn off the heat. Exciting times lie ahead. Now we are ready to assemble this lasagna lasan, just grease the plate with a little olive oil, place your first noodles on the base here, just make sure they fit accordingly, yes, a few tablespoons of white wine sauce on top of the Noodles, Julia says. Be a little more conservative with the sauce on the bottom layers and then as you work your way up you can start using a little heavier.

Spread half of the green vegetables. Honestly, I have a lot of this white sauce, so why not? just add a little more I'm going to go against Julia here 3 tablespoons of cheese so here's a little bit of parm goua there's a little bit of provolone half the meat diced spread it out evenly half the mushrooms I feel like it's being a little stingy with the white sauce, it says just a few tablespoons but I'm going to go with a few more tablespoons right now we top with more pasta and the spinach that I had left over more combined cheese don't get us cheap any meat you have left here the remaining mushrooms more spoonfuls bashal cup of ricotta she says add that now I thought it probably could have gone on the bottom layer too but what another layer of pasta and then with the overlapping things she just stuffs them in so that one What What you should keep in mind when you watch me do this is that she doesn't mention ketchup until the end and honestly, since there's so much to see here, I forgot about the ketchup too, it's over. but I did a wonderful job layering everything and she never mentioned ketchup, so what's a man to do here?

She says just put it on top, that's fine, so now we pour more white sauce with a spoonful of tomato sauce on top of it. Spread it unevenly without leaving anything exposed. I'd like it to be nice and golden brown on top and if I sprinkle on the remaining cheese that will give me a last bit of Parmesan, so no, since you're making a little YouTube video here. You have a cute little video. You want to make sure the baking dish looks halfway decent. You know, presentable for your viewers. 400° F. I'm going to bake this for about 30 minutes and I'm going to go to the top. a third of the way through the oven and I already have a baking dish in there because this is going to get messy.

I know, you know after 30 minutes, this looks sexy, but I'm going to turn on the broiler because I want the cheese. the top should be brown, this thing is ready, order, I realize the challenges of trying to get the first slice of lasagna out of this thing, things are going to get a little, oh, okay, I got it, By the way, it was very difficult to film that. it's very it's a disaster I'm a disaster served with a hearty red wine like a balet Opa well, it's delicious and if you're going to ask me love, you actually know what was above average, fantastic with a capital F and I.

I don't know if I would have enjoyed it as much if I had just used the leftovers Julia was mentioning, like if I had the leftover spinach in the fridge with the leftover chicken, well, whatever was on my finger would have some airtime. ,uh, if only I had used the leftovers Julia mentioned. I used, you know, things that were a couple of days old. I don't know if they would have been as good as the same with the pasta, as you know, when you make it at home, you know, you put in the effort and it pays off in the end, the only complaint is that I wish I had added the tomato sauce on top of each layer .

I felt like it was lacking, it was like just on top it wasn't enough, other than that I loved it so I'm I'm a happy guy here and I really don't know what kind of comments I'm going to get on this so you can call me ignorant if you want, but Julia was also called that, so I'm fine. company this is Jamie and Julia bone appetite orra