Lasagna (, also , also known as lasagne, ) is a type of pasta, possibly one of the oldest types, made of very wide, flat sheets. Either term can also refer to an Italian dish made of stacked layers of lasagna alternating with fillings such as ragù (ground meats and tomato sauce), vegetables, cheeses (which may include ricotta, mozzarella, and

parmesan Parmesan ( it, Parmigiano Reggiano; ) is an Italian hard, granular cheese produced from cows’ milk and aged at least 12 months. It is named after two of the areas which produce it, the provinces of Parma and Reggio Emilia (''Parmigiano'' is ...

), and seasonings and spices. The dish may be topped with grated cheese, which becomes melted after baking. Typically cooked pasta is assembled with the other ingredients and then baked in an oven. The resulting baked pasta is cut into single-serving square portions.

Origins and history

Lasagna originated in Italy during the Middle Ages. The oldest transcribed text about lasagna appears in 1282 in the ''Memoriali Bolognesi'' ("Bolognesi Memorials"), in which lasagna was mentioned in a poem transcribed by a Bolognese notary; while the first recorded recipe was set down in the early 14th-century '' Liber de Coquina'' (''The Book of Cookery''). It bore only a slight resemblance to the later traditional form of lasagna, featuring a fermented dough flattened into thin sheets, boiled, sprinkled with cheese and spices, and then eaten with a small pointed stick.Serventi, ''Pasta: the story of a universal food'', Columbia UP, 2012, p.235 Recipes written in the century following the ''Liber de Coquina'' recommended boiling the pasta in chicken broth and dressing it with cheese and chicken fat. In a recipe adapted for the

Lent Lent ( la, Quadragesima, 'Fortieth') is a solemn religious observance in the liturgical calendar commemorating the 40 days Jesus spent fasting in the desert and enduring temptation by Satan, according to the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke ...

fast Fast or FAST may refer to: * Fast (noun), high speed or velocity * Fast (noun, verb), to practice fasting, abstaining from food and/or water for a certain period of time Acronyms and coded Computing and software * ''Faceted Application of Subje ...

, walnuts were recommended.

Variations

Pasta

Mass-produced lasagna with a ruffled edge is called ''lasagna riccia'', ''doppio festone'', ''sciabò'' and ''sciablò''.Oretta Zanini De Vita. ''Encyclopedia of Pasta.'' University of California Press, 2019
p. 148.
In the Veneto, factory-produced ''lasagne'' are called ''bardele'' or ''lasagnoni''. Narrower ''lasagne'' are ''mezze lasagne'', and if with a ruffled edge, ''mezze lasagne ricche''. Similar pastas are the narrower '' lasagnette'' and its longer cousin, the '' lasagnotte'' (''cappellasci'' 'sic''in Liguria), as well as the ''sagne'' of Salento (the "heel" of the Italian "boot") and ''lagana'' in the reminder of

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Dish

The lasagna of Naples, ''lasagne di carnevale'', is layered with local sausage, small fried

meatballs A meatball is ground meat rolled into a ball, sometimes along with other ingredients, such as bread crumbs, minced onion, eggs, butter, and seasoning. Meatballs are cooked by frying, baking, steaming, or braising in sauce. There are many types ...

, hard-boiled eggs, ricotta and mozzarella cheeses, and sauced with a Neapolitan ragù, a meat sauce. ''Lasagne al forno'', layered with a thicker ragù and béchamel sauce and corresponding to the most common version of the dish outside Italy, is traditionally associated with the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy. Here, and especially in its capital, Bologna, layers of lasagna are traditionally green (the colour is obtained by mixing spinach or other vegetables into the dough) and served with ragù (a thick sauce made from onions, carrots, celery, finely ground pork and beef, butter, and tomatoes), bechamel and Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese. In other regions, lasagna can be made with various combinations of ricotta or mozzarella cheese, tomato sauce, meats (such as ground beef, pork or chicken), and vegetables (such as spinach, zucchini, olives, mushrooms), and the dish is typically flavoured with wine,

garlic Garlic (''Allium sativum'') is a species of bulbous flowering plant in the genus ''Allium''. Its close relatives include the onion, shallot, leek, chive, Allium fistulosum, Welsh onion and Allium chinense, Chinese onion. It is native to South A ...

, onion, and

oregano Oregano (, ; ''Origanum vulgare'') is a species of flowering plant in the mint family Lamiaceae. It was native to the Mediterranean region, but widely naturalised elsewhere in the temperate Northern Hemisphere. Oregano is a woody perennial pla ...

. In all cases, the lasagne are baked ( al forno). Traditionally pasta dough prepared in

Southern Italy Southern Italy ( it, Sud Italia or ) also known as ''Meridione'' or ''Mezzogiorno'' (), is a macroregion of the Italian Republic consisting of its southern half. The term ''Mezzogiorno'' today refers to regions that are associated with the peop ...

used semolina and water; in the northern regions, where semolina was not available,

flour Flour is a powder made by grinding raw grains, roots, beans, nuts, or seeds. Flours are used to make many different foods. Cereal flour, particularly wheat flour, is the main ingredient of bread, which is a staple food for many culture ...

and eggs were used. In modern Italy, since the only type of wheat allowed for commercially sold pasta is

durum wheat Durum wheat (), also called pasta wheat or macaroni wheat (''Triticum durum'' or ''Triticum turgidum'' subsp. ''durum''), is a Polyploid, tetraploid species of wheat. It is the second most cultivated species of wheat after common wheat, although ...

, industrial lasagna are made of semolina from durum wheat. Nonetheless, in the north and especially in Emilia-Romagna, the tradition of egg-based dough remains popular for artisanal and homemade productions.

Etymology

In Ancient Rome, there was a dish similar to a traditional lasagna called ''lasana'' or ''lasanum'' ( Latin for 'container' or 'pot') described in the book ''

De re coquinaria ''Apicius'', also known as ''De re culinaria'' or ''De re coquinaria'' (''On the Subject of Cooking'') is a collection of Roman cookery recipes. It is thought to have been compiled in the fifth century AD. Its language is in many ways closer ...

'' by

Marcus Gavius Apicius Marcus Gavius Apicius is believed to have been a Roman gourmet and lover of luxury, who lived sometime in the 1st century AD, during the reign of Tiberius. The Roman cookbook ''Apicius'' is often attributed to him, though it is impossible to prov ...

,, but the word could have a more ancient origin. 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 Clean Monday ( el, Καθαρά Δευτέρα), also known as Pure Monday, Ash Monday, Monday of Lent or Green Monday, is the first day of Great Lent throughout Eastern Christianity and is a moveable feast, falling on the 6th Monday before ...

. Another theory is that the word lasagna comes from the Greek λάσανα (''lasana'') or λάσανον (''lasanon'') meaning ' trivet', 'stand for a pot' or 'chamber pot'. The Romans borrowed the word as ''lasanum'', meaning 'cooking pot'. The Italians used the word to refer to the cookware in which lasagna is made. Later the food took on the name of the serving dish. Another proposed link or reference is the 14th-century English dish ''loseyn'' as described in '' The Forme of Cury'', a cookbook prepared by "the chief Master Cooks of King Richard II", which included English recipes as well as dishes influenced by Spanish, French, Italian, and Arab cuisines. This dish has similarities to modern lasagna in both its recipe, which features a layering of ingredients between pasta sheets, and its name. An important difference is the lack of tomatoes, which did not arrive in Europe until after Columbus reached the Americas in 1492. The earliest discussion of the tomato in European literature appeared in a herbal written in 1544 by Pietro Andrea Mattioli, while the earliest cookbook found with tomato recipes was published in Naples in 1692, but the author had obtained these recipes from Spanish sources. As with most other types of pasta, the Italian word is a plural form: ''lasagne'' meaning more than one sheet of ''lasagna'', though, in many other languages, a derivative of the singular word ''lasagna'' is used for the popular baked pasta dish. When referring to the baked dish, regional usage in Italy favours the plural form ''lasagne'' in the north of the country and the singular ''lasagna'' in the south. The former plural usage has influenced the usual spelling found in British English, while the southern Italian singular usage has influenced the spelling often used in

American English American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of variety (linguistics), varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the Languages of the United States, most widely spoken lan ...

. Both ''lasagne'' and ''lasagna'' are used as singular non-count (uncountable) nouns in English.Laurie Bauer, Rochelle Lieber and Ingo Plag. ''The Oxford Reference Guide to English Morphology.'' Oxford University Press, 2015
p. 139.

Gallery

File:Lasagne.png, Flat sheets of lasagna before cooking File:Pasta 2006 8.jpg, Lasagna with ruffled edges File:Lasagna 2.jpg, Completely ridged lasagna File:Vegetarian-lasagna .jpg, Vegetarian lasagna made with tomato sauce,

spinach Spinach (''Spinacia oleracea'') is a leafy green flowering plant native to central and western Asia. It is of the order Caryophyllales, family Amaranthaceae, subfamily Chenopodioideae. Its leaves are a common edible vegetable consumed either f ...

, feta,

carrot The carrot ('' Daucus carota'' subsp. ''sativus'') is a root vegetable, typically orange in color, though purple, black, red, white, and yellow cultivars exist, all of which are domesticated forms of the wild carrot, ''Daucus carota'', nat ...

s, mushrooms and grated emmental File:Lasagna bolognese.jpg, Green lasagna (made with

in the dough), with ragù, Parmesan and bechamel, typical of

Bolognese Bologna (, , ; egl, label= Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nati ...

cuisine File:Lasagna (1).jpg, Close-up profile view of a lasagna casserole, showing the layers of sauce, cheese and other ingredients

References

General references

External links

* * {{Authority control Casserole dishes Cheese dishes Italian cuisine Cuisine of Emilia-Romagna Neapolitan cuisine Pasta dishes Types of pasta Italian-American cuisine Wide pasta