Using the Ol' Noodle

In American we're getting the short end of the noodle! In recent years I've tried the "no-cook" lasagna noodles sold in stores, but they're pretty much just regular noodles and you cook them with more sauce and get kind of a gummy lasagna.

Yesterday, because we are all out of gummy American noodles, The Linguist ran to the store to procure some more. Most of the pasta we've seen here looks like what we eat in America. It's even the same brand! So I expected a regular box of noodles, but he came home with something different --thinner, shorter, rectangular sheets of pasta, one box of green and one box of yellow. The package said to make the lasagna without precooking the noodles and then to bake at 200 degrees Celsius for 20 minutes. Twenty minutes?! I've never heard of a non-precooked noodle baking up in 20 minutes. Heck, my precooked noodles still take closer to 45 minutes.

With some trepidation, I made 2 different lasagnas -- one a regular tomato, meat and cheese. The other was a new recipe that had broccoli and mushrooms in a white sauce. I put them in the fridge all day and pulled them out and baked them for 30 minutes, and they were delicious, non-gummy and warm through. They were probably done after 20, but I was nervous about trusting the noodle. The noodle layer was thinner than what we normally eat in America, but I am happy to trade that in for 1/2 the cooking time. I think that's using the ol' noodle!