lasagne alle vongole
lasagne with clams in a tomato sauce
A great, simple pasta dish that shows how amazingly flexible lasagne can be. Instead of layering the sheets with other ingredients and cooking in the oven, here the lasagne are simpy boiled like any other fresh pasta and dressed with a simple, delicious sauce. And the only issue there being how to make it delicious - the baby clams you use are crucial, tinned are acceptable but whether they’re fresh or tinned thay shouldn’t be gritty in texture but tender and sweet.
WHAT YOU'LL NEED TO DO
(scroll down for the full method)
prepare the ingredients
purge the vongole
make the sauce
cook the vongole
boil the pasta
shell the vogole
combine pasta and sauce
add vongole
lasagne with clams in a tomato sauce
INGREDIENTS
FOR FOUR PEOPLE
400-600g polpa (Mutti)
fresh or tinned baby clams
garlic
PASTA
400g fresh lasagne sheets
MANTECATURA (?)
none
METHOD
Start by making a simple tomato sauce - it’s as easy as opening a good quality tin of polpa (or crushing good quality peeled, tinned, plum tomatoes by hand) and cooking it in a pan with a tablespoon of EVO and a clove or two of garlic. Purists will usually expect a handful of fresh, chopped parsley thrown in at the last moment or even as the tomato sauce reduces, but I’m just as happy with the same amount of fresh basil leaves. You decide. If you’re using fresh clams (which of course you've purged in salt water at 20 degrees for 5-6 hours), cook them now in garlic and white wine and shell all of them.
If you’re using tinned clams, they need to be rinsed and go into the tomato just before you think it’s reduced enough for your tastes, so that they can flavour the sauce - make sure they are warmed through thoroughly and are piping hot. At the same time as all of that, boil some roughly torn fresh lasagne sheets and a minute or so before they’re done, transfer them to the pan of tomatoes and clams so they can finish cooking there. Serve with black or cayenne pepper. And ignore snobs who say you can’t put cheese on fish dishes. Pecorino or parmesan is perfectly acceptable with pasta fish dishes.
NUTRITION per serving
KCAL: we're working on it!
Fat (g): TBC
Sat Fat (g): TBC
Carb (g): TBC
Sug (g): TBC
Fibre(g): TBC
Prot (g): TBC
Salt (g): TBC
