Recipe Mushroom Ragu Lasagne with Celeriac Béchamel
Gluten-free option
Soy-free option
Refined sugar free
Nut-free option
Freshly Picked
Easy peasy
Comfort food
Entertaining
Lazy dinners
Main meals
This lasagne is the ultimate comfort food, and it uses a “cheats” version of mushroom soy sauce to give it that extra umami flavour. Your friends and family will be raving about it for days — if you’re willing to share ;)
You will need
Serves 8
- 1 packet vegan lasagne sheets (gluten-free if required)
- Extra virgin olive oil
- Salt
Ragu
- 100g swiss brown mushrooms
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 50ml vegetable oil
- 1 leek, diced
- 1 red capsicum, diced
- 1 long red chilli
- 3 sprigs thyme
- 1 stalk celery, diced
- 1 carrot, diced
- 1 onion, diced
- 2 bay leaves
- 3 sprigs thyme
- 3 cloves garlic, sliced
- 300g mixed mushrooms
- 30g dried shiitake mushrooms
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste
- 100ml red wine
- 1 x (400g) can cherry tomatoes
- 300ml vegetable stock
- 1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
- Bunch parsley stalks, roughly chopped
Plant-based Bèchamel
- 1 celeriac
- 300ml oat milk (or plant milk of choice)
- 2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- Thyme
Breadcrumbs
- 200g bread crumbs (gluten-free if required)
- 2 cloves garlic
- 3 sprigs thyme
Recipe: Simon Toohey
Directions
-
Step 1
Preheat the oven to 180°C.
-
Step 2
Start by making the cheat’s mushroom soy sauce. Blitz up the Swiss brown mushroom in a food processor with some salt. Spoon into a bowl and let it sit for as long as it takes to make the rest of the ingredients.
-
Step 3
In the meantime place a large saucepan on medium-low heat and add the vegetable oil, dice up the leek, capsicum, red chilli with the seeds removed if you would like, celery, carrot, onion, garlic, bay leaves and thyme and place into the pan and cook away for a 10 minutes or so until the onions have become translucent. The longer and slower you cook this part, the deeper and sweeter the flavour will be.
-
Step 4
Dice up the mixed mushrooms and throw them in. Blend the dried shiitake to a powder and add that in too. Cook the mushrooms until the liquid has been cooked out.
-
Step 5
Add the red wine, vegetable stock, tin of cherry tomatoes, smoked paprika, parsley stalks and tomato paste. Squeeze the liquid out of the salted mushrooms into the pot. Reserve the mushrooms till the end and keep cooking on medium heat until the liquid has been cooked out again. Cook over a low heat for a further 40 minutes, or until the mixture has reduced.
-
Step 6
In the meantime, peel the celeriac and chop it up into small inch sized bits. Add them to a saucepan with the oat milk, nutritional yeast and salt and pepper and cook until it has gone super soft. Remove the bay leaves and thyme stalks and blitz to a smooth paste.
-
Step 7
Combine the bread crumbs with the thyme and minced garlic.
-
Step 8
Lay a ladle of the mushroom ragu at the bottom of a baking tray, then lay some lasagne sheets on top then more mushroom, then the béchamel then pasta sheets and repeat until you run out of either space, pasta sheets, or ragu. You always, however, want to finish with the béchamel.
-
Step 9
Top the béchamel with the garlic bread crumb mixture, drizzle a small amount of olive oil to help the breadcrumbs go crispy and top with a pinch of salt.
-
Step 10
Cover with foil and bake in the oven for 20 minutes, then remove the foil and continue baking for another 20 minutes or until the top is a roasted golden and bubbling away.
-
Step 11
Allow to sit for 30–45 minutes before serving.
Recipe: Simon Toohey
