James' Lentil & Aubergine Lasagne

James’ Lentil & Aubergine Lasagne

James May

Featuring:

Aubergine

Beans & pulses

Tomato

Effort:

Complexity:

Cost:

In season now

Serves: 4

Prep time: 15 mins

Cook time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

1 tbsp olive oil

 2 red onions, peeled and chopped 

2 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed 

2 aubergines, roughly chopped

1 red pepper, deseeded and chopped

1 x 400g can of chopped tomatoes

1 x 400g can of green lentils, drained

A handful of flat-leaf parsley, chopped 

6–8 dried lasagne sheets

4 tbsp freshly grated Parmesan cheese

For the white sauce:

50g butter

50g flour

650ml milk, at room temperature, not straight from the fridge

Freshly grated nutmeg

Veg Portions / Serving: 2

Recipe from James May’s Oh Cook!: 60 easy recipes that any idiot can make, published by Pavilion Books. Photography by Martin Poole.

Our witless and trusting bovine chums will thank you for making this vegetarian interpretation of the stratified minced beef, pasta and sauce standard. This version is better than you might think. Chop the aubergine and pepper very thoroughly in the ‘chopper upperer’ as you want a nice dense filling. Be meticulous about trimming your pasta sheets to fit your oven dish. You don’t want any crusty bits sticking out.

Method:

Heat the oil in a large frying pan, add the onion and cook until it softens – around 4 minutes. Then add the garlic and cook for a further 5 minutes. Keep stirring, you halfwit.

Add the aubergine and cook for another 5 minutes, until it starts to go brown. Throw in the pepper, tomatoes and lentils. Season and cook gently for 30 minutes. If the mixture becomes a bit dry, add a splash of water. Once cooked, stir in the chopped parsley and let it cool.

Preheat the oven to 200ºC/gas 6.

To make the white sauce, melt the butter in a medium saucepan without letting it burn, then whisk in the flour, a little at a time, stirring until it’s well incorporated. It should stick together but not quite form a ball. Cook for a few minutes, whisking constantly, so the flour cooks out.

Slowly whisk in the milk, a little at a time, until it thickens. Keep stirring, then add in some freshly grated nutmeg.

In your baking dish, layer the veg sauce, followed by pasta, followed by more veg sauce, followed by white sauce. Add another layer of pasta and then repeat the layers, finishing with the white sauce. Trim and arrange the pasta sheets so there are no ugly bits sticking out.

Scatter the cheese on top and bake for 30 minutes until the top is golden brown.

Serve on plates with cutlery. [!]

Engaging Kids

Kids who engage regularly with veg through veg-themed activities, such as arts and crafts, sensory experiences, growing and cooking are shown to be more likely to eat the veg they engage with. Encouraging kids to engage and play with veg is the handy first step to them developing a good relationship with veg and life-long healthy eating.

Kids in the kitchen

Have the kids help you with assembling the lasagne by layering up the ingredients and scattering the cheese over the top. Older kids could help you with the cooking process by adding ingredients to the pan and stirring safely with careful supervision – a great way to learn about kitchen safety.

Find more ideas, safety tips, videos and even a free chart in our Kids in the Kitchen section here.

Master these skills:

Cleaning vegetables, Weighing, Claw chopping

More about Kitchen Ninja Skills

Activities

Why not download, cutout and colour-in an aubergine veg facemask?

Kids more into science? Aubergines contain loads of water – you can explore this with the “sweaty aubergine” experiment. Yep, that’s what it’s called! Follow the simple experiment here.

You can find more at-home science fun with veg with our videos from Stefan Gates’ here.

Find loads more free veg-themed crafts here and games here.

Sensory

Aubergine can be great fun to explore through look and touch. If you can, getting a couple of different aubergines (they come in different sizes and colours or patterns) would be a bonus! What colours do you see? What shapes? What does it remind you of? What does it feel like when you hold it? Is it smooth, rough, bumpy, soft, hard? What does it feel like to you? Cut the aubergine in half lengthways and see if it looks and feels different and reminds you of new things.

Find more sensory ideas, tips and videos here. If you get stuck and need a little help with describing words, we have a selection for you here, too!