Hubris In The Form Of Lasagna

Hubris

English picked up both the concept of hubris and the term for that particular brand of cockiness from the ancient Greeks, who considered hubris a dangerous character flaw capable of provoking the wrath of the gods. In classical Greek tragedy, hubris was often a fatal shortcoming that brought about the fall of the tragic hero. Typically, overconfidence led the hero to attempt to overstep the boundaries of human limitations and assume a godlike status, and the gods inevitably humbled the offender with a sharp reminder of their mortality.

For months I have been thinking and talking of making lasagna. It is a dish that I've made since I was first married and I've lost track of the number of times I've made it. In the beginning, it was always associated with Christmas. I made a very specific, personalized version that was made to Wife's specific liking. As our children got into elementary school, they preferred we make pizza on the holiday and that became the family tradition. But I kept making lasagna at other times of the year. Always it was the occasional 'big event' dish because it took a lot of effort the way I did it. 

Then I started to make pasta from scratch. This led me to become more creative with the lasagna genre motivated by the lighter homemade pasta noodles. It had been a quite a while since I'd made one. It's the kind of dish that serves a lot so its nice to have a group to serve it to. Cooking for large numbers seems to be one of those things that one lets go off as age starts eating into one's physical abilities. So I hadn't the motivation.

But, with all the talking of my making lasagna prowess, I decided I was going to do it this holiday. I had in my mind a number of enhancements to make the process more efficient. Since Wife was my only customer, I would make the 'classic' version. I would create an epic blog post going step-by-step through the process to the glorious outcome. However, as my grandiose vision arose, the Gods saw the need bring things in line. 

A Tale of Death by a Thousand Cuts

It was not a single catastrophic failure that brings about the hubris like end to our story. It is rather a series of minor errors that combined lead to de-I's downfall. And since I am writing this as a mea culpa to my sin of hubris, I will go through all the gory details of my downfall

I went through much planning and effort to make for an easier time on the day of actual preparation. Here is everything laid out and ready to go. Though in that preparation, I already had planted seeds of the unpleasant future

From the upper left corner going clockwise - Cheese sauce, Italian sausage, Meatballs, Tomato sauce, Mozzarella cheese, Parmigiano Reggiano cheese. Below is my beloved 1950's something roasting pan I use only for making lasagna. (A note on the Cheese sauce - in Northern Italy they like to use Bechamel, a cream sauce. In Southern Italy they like Ricotta cheese. As most American Italians are of Southern Italian descent, Ricotta is the default ingredient. I didn't like either so I added cheese to my Bechamel. The problem with this, as we will see, is you lose a structure providing ingredient that Ricotta provides.)

You will note the Cheese sauce because it was made the day before had solidified. That was a root cause of one of my errors. You will not see that the Tomato sauce had a flaw as well. I like cooking it with some bone-in meat to give it more depth. But I chose a cut with a lot of smaller bones and connective tissue. These fell apart in the cooking process. I was able to fish out most. But some small bone pieces made it through. These were Very Unpleasant to run into in the final product)

Left to make on the day of, the pasta

Don't forget that all important Italian Semola flour!

In fact the pasta turned out extremely well...accept for one problem I will uncover below.

On to assembly - a layer of sauce on the bottom followed by the first layer of pasta

 

You might notice one of the unforeseen flaws here, the delicate nature of the pasta.

Our next layer is the Mozzarella, Meatballs, with another layer of sauce

Here we find another error, the amount of sauce. It is a delicate balance. You need enough sauce so the lasagna isn't dry. But too much at it will be soupy and not hold its shape.

Our next layer will add the Cheese Sauce, the Italian Sausage, and more Tomato Sauce

Two more errors - it's not easy to notice in the middle picture above but I put that whole container of Cheese Sauce in because it was solid and I couldn't get it to spread out. But when I cooked it, it all melted creating a lot of liquid. And I put a lot more Tomato Sauce on. We're like the lasagna version of the Titanic at this point not realizing our doom is upon us.

The last layer of Pasta with more Tomato Sauce and a coating of Parmigiano Reggiano.

Then into the oven

Where I proceeded to make a series more errors. I had seen on a recent video where they cooked the lasagna at 350 degrees covered in foil for 30 minutes and then under the broiler for 10 minutes to crisp the top. HOWEVER, should have remembered that because of the size of my lasagnas and the effect of altitude that I needed to cook it at a higher temperature. And I've never covered my lasagna so why I decided to do so now was a mystery. 

It took much longer to cook as a result. When I put it under the broiler, I was distracted because one of the daughters called. It ended up partially burning on the top! The final blow.

Wife and I were starving. Under the best of circumstances one should let his rest to firm up a bit. Historically, my first day lasagnas have always been on the 'wet' side. But this was a soup. A major contributor? The Pasta. It was great pasta. Just the wrong pasta for this application. The delicate pasta simply didn't hold its shape in all this liquid. Store bought firmer pasta would have been a much better choice.

The sad looking plate

Now here is the real irony. The flavor of it was really good! It was spot on the classic version. BUT I DISCOVERED I REALLY DON'T LIKE THAT VERSION ANY MORE!  Our tastes change at every aspect of life, and I just don't enjoy the Tomato Sauce forward version that this is. I like my more delicate, meat sauce versions that go with my homemade pasta. 

So my Hubris event was complete.