The pleasantly bitter leaves of radicchio are used to make this unusual lasagne. It’s one of the many imaginative recipes that appears in Venezia: food and dreams, the new cookery book by Tessa Kiros (pub. Murdoch RRP £25.00 hardback), and appears here with permission. In Venezia, Tessa Kiros suggests that you use radicchio di Treviso leaves, a long rather than round variety. They vary in size so you will need between two and four for this recipe. To make this Lasagne di radicchio, you will need a rectangular oven dish about 35 x 24 cm (14 x 19 inches) so the pasta sheets will fit perfectly – once they are boiled they swell up to larger than their uncooked size.
Radicchio Lasagne – Recipe
Lasagne di radicchio
Ingredients – Serves 6-8
- 800g (1lb 12 oz) radicchio di Treviso
- 6 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 onion, thinly sliced
- 60 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) white wine
- 12 pasta sheets (pre-boil variety), about 18 x 9 cm (7 x 3½ inches)
- 6 tablespoons grated parmesan
Bechamel sauce:
- 100g (3½ oz) butter
- 70g (2½ oz) flour
- 750 ml (26 fl oz/3 cups) warm milk
- A good grating of nutmeg
Method
- Cut away and discard the tough white stalk from the bottom of the radicchio. Roughly cut up the rest into chunky strips along the length, wash and drain.
- Heat 5 tablespoons of the oil in a large frying pan and sauté the onion until soft and pale golden. Add the wine and cook until evaporated. Add the radicchio, cover and simmer over a low heat until it surrenders its hardness. Add salt and pepper and cook, stirring now and then with a wooden spoon, until it is soft and there is hardly any liquid left in the pan. Remove the pan lid for the last 5 minutes or so.
- Bring a pot of water to the boil, then salt it and add the last tablespoon of oil. Cook the pasta sheets for the time indicated on the box or until almost cooked (it will all go in the oven and continue cooking). Remove, refresh in cold water and lay out the sheets on a tray lined with clean tea towels, making a couple of layers as necessary to accommodate all the pasta sheets.
- Make the béchamel sauce. Melt the butter in a heavy-based saucepan. Whisk the flour into the butter, then add a little salt and pepper and cook for a few minutes, stirring. Reduce the heat to low then begin adding the warm milk. It will be immediately absorbed, so work quickly, whisking with one hand while slowly pouring the milk with the other. When the sauce is smooth and thick, add the nutmeg, remove the pan from the heat and leave to cool (it should thicken even more). Adjust the seasoning.
- Preheat your oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4). Now assemble the lasagne. Dollop a couple of large serving spoonfuls of béchamel onto the bottom of the oven dish, spreading it to cover. Lay 3 pieces of pasta over the béchamel, overlapping them if necessary.
- Splatter half the radicchio (not in a neat perfect layer) over the pasta. Dollop some more béchamel over the radicchio and spread gently here and there. Scatter with about 2 tablespoons of the parmesan. Now add another layer of pasta, the rest of the radicchio, some more béchamel (not all of it – save ½ cupful or so for the top) and another couple of tablespoons of parmesan.
- Add the final layer of pasta and cover roughly with the rest of the béchamel. Sprinkle with the rest of the parmesan and add a few blobs of butter. Bake for 20-30 minutes until lovely and crusty here and there. Cool a little before serving.
Try this Amaretti Tart Recipe from Venezia
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