Freezing lasagna: pre-cook or not?

[jennyema]

Kat -- ever consider a crockpot? Seriously, those things were made for people with schedules like yours.

 

[mish]

so i am making lasagna for the first time this weekend. most of the recipies i've found use a 9x13 pan. since it's just me and my boyfriend that will eat it, i was planning on splitting it into two pans and freeze one for later. my question is should i underbake the one taht i'm going to freeze, or leave it raw? i have barilla no boil lasagna sheets and i'm not sure if freezing the pasta sheets dry will mess up the texture. also, waht's a good ratio of cheeses, i have ricotta, parmesan and mozzarella? thanks alot

Hi Kat. Welcome to DC.

I would not undercook/half-bake or freeze raw lasagna. There are many easy recipes for no boil noodles lasagna, most are submerged in sauce and covered to steam & cook the noodles/dish thru. If you would like a recipe, send up a flare. You can easily adjust the pan size, but need to adjust the cooking time as well. Best solution, cook the lasagna thru, let cool, wrap and freeze.

 

[BreezyCooking]

Guys - please forgive me ahead of time if this sounds snippy, because I know it will, lol. We're talking about LASAGANA here. Not curing cancer.

For God's sake - do what you want. Whatever suits you best. I can't believe this thread has gone on as long as it has. Let's face it - there are two variations. You make, bake, & then freeze the lasagna. Or you make it & then freeze it raw & bake it later (personally, yuck).

The raw vs. cooked folks are NOT going to change their minds. I know that I'm not about to.

Now we're getting into crockpots & partially cooked lasagnas? IT'S LASAGNA!!!!! It's been made for several DECADES without requiring pages & pages of instruction.

Again - I'm sorry ahead of time for the tirade, but these sort of threads over something that's been made easily & successfully nearly since time began drive me nuts.

 

[mish]

Guys - please forgive me ahead of time if this sounds snippy, because I know it will, lol. We're talking about LASAGANA here. Not curing cancer.

For God's sake - do what you want. Whatever suits you best. I can't believe this thread has gone on as long as it has. Let's face it - there are two variations. You make, bake, & then freeze the lasagna. Or you make it & then freeze it raw & bake it later (personally, yuck).

The raw vs. cooked folks are NOT going to change their minds. I know that I'm not about to.

Now we're getting into crockpots & partially cooked lasagnas? IT'S LASAGNA!!!!! It's been made for several DECADES without requiring pages & pages of instruction.

Again - I'm sorry ahead of time for the tirade, but these sort of threads over something that's been made easily & successfully nearly since time began drive me nuts.

Breezy I agree to a certain extent...yep folks tend to meander, and not read the question. Since it's Kat's first time making Lasagna, I think folks here were trying to be helpful. Something that may be obvious to you or I, may not be clear to a beginner -- or anyone that has a question. And no way would I recommend freezing raw or half-cooked lasagna

 

[Gretchen]

With all due respect, I think the crockpot suggestion was for other dishes that might help simplify the OP's busy life that she described further on--not necessarily for lasagna.
But TOTALLY agree that it can be done either way--uncooked or cooked. I just much prefer baking it fresh when I am serving it and therefore freeze uncooked. It does very well.

 

[BreezyCooking]

Oh Lord - I wasn't even going to enter the "half-cooking" debate. That just goes beyond my cooking/safety sensibilities - lol! Anyone who wants to venture into that is on their own - lol!

And if you really want to make true "lasagne", cooked or not, put the crockpot away.

 

[Kat]

well, i cooked one pan up last night and it turned out pretty good. i kinda improvised it a bit, used a bolognese sauce i like and found a good mixture of cheeses. i put the other half in the freezer unbaked, we'll see what happens when i cook it, maybe next week. i know it may seem like a no brainer to some, but no one in my family has ever made lasagna (i know, hard to believe), so i didn't really have any basic knowledge on how to make it. i'm kinda teaching myself how to cook too, since my mom worked 70 hours a week for the family business and my dad just didn't cook anything interesting, so there's probably some basic things i just haven't figured out yet, but this forum has really helped.

also, i did the slow cooker thing for quite awhile until both me and the bf got sick of things slow cooked. i don't know if i was just looking in the wrong places/websites, but it seemed that every recipe called for cream of mushroom/chicken soup, onion soup packets, canned veggies. now, not to sound hoity toity, but i prefer to only use canned veggies (tomatoes excluded) and canned soups as a last resort. i wasn't really brought up on canned/boxed/frozen food, so i don't have much taste for it. nothing against it, it's just not for me. and i'm trying to eat healtier with fresh fruit and veggies, didn't seem like any recipe i found was terribly low fat/nutrient rich.

anyway, sorry for the rant, but thanks for the tips. i know there's different ways of doing things, i was just looking for opinions. food people are like car people, they have their way and that's the best and there's no arguing. no offense to anyone intended.

 

[GB]

Don't give up on Crock Pot cooking just because you do not like using canned veggies, soups, and soup packets. There are TONS of great slow cooker recipes out there that do not use any of the above. I do not think any of my slow cooker recipes use anything like that (again with the exception of canned tomatoes). My favorite slow cooker recipe uses lentils, fresh celery and carrots, canned tomatoes, but you can certainly use fresh if you want, beef stock, kielbasa, and maybe some other stuff.

If the only slow cooker recipes I found called for a can of soup and canned veggies then I would probably want to give up on them too

 

[Constance]

Mish, I haven't followed this discussion very closely, so excuse me if I'm being redundant.
Are you worried that freezing raw or half-cooked lasagna might be a health issue?

 

[mish]

Mish, I haven't followed this discussion very closely, so excuse me if I'm being redundant.
Are you worried that freezing raw or half-cooked lasagna might be a health issue?

Hi Connie. Now that you mention it, maybe a frozen an uncooked egg/cheese mixture might not be healthy. Hadn't thought about that, since I wouldn't freeze a raw or half cooked noodle mixture. But, hey, that's just me. There are some very quick no-boil noodle lasagana & baked ziti recipe links I posted on the forum, if one is in a hurry or wants to try a different cooking method.

 

[Gretchen]

Ummm, there are a lot of frozen uncooked lasagnas in the freezer section. It is FINE to freeze uncooked lasagna. Don't half cook it.

 

[mish]

Ummm, there are a lot of frozen uncooked lasagnas in the freezer section. It is FINE to freeze uncooked lasagna. Don't half cook it.

I believe the frozen lasagna in the freezer section of the market may already be pre-cooked, frozen and packaged by pros --prepared in a certain way for marketing/freezing/shelf-life/cooking. Probably lots of preservatives added as well. Just my personal preference not to opt for uncooked or half cooked noodles in the freezer. That's the beauty of this forum. We can all give our opinions/likes & dislikes. BTW, Stouffer's is pretty good.

 

[BreezyCooking]

Supermarket freezer section lasagnas are ALL precooked. Where did you get your info that any brands are uncooked, Gretchen?

That said, I still don't see where there's any advantage whatsoever to freezing lasagna uncooked. You have to cook it eventually, don't you?? And quite frankly I'd feel much safer freezing a completely cooked product than I would an uncooked one. Especially, as someone else pointed out, one was using eggs as a binder in one of the layers. Not to mention you have to freeze it whole. You can't freeze it uncooked in portions - a major drawback as far as I'm concerned.

I really do not understand the advantage at all. Just bake the darn thing, portion it out, wrap well, & freeze it. What's the problem with that? I mean, really, how long does it take to bake lasagna? An hour tops?

 

[GB]

I really do not understand the advantage at all. Just bake the darn thing, portion it out, wrap well, & freeze it. What's the problem with that? I mean, really, how long does it take to bake lasagna? An hour tops?

BreezyCooking, everyone has their own way of doing things. Just because someone does not do it your way does not mean it is not worth doing.

 

[CharlieD]

I have to agree everybody has their own way, it's just that my way is the right one and everybody who doesn't agree with it are simply wrong.

 

[CharlieD]

Mish, what did you mean by fresh pasta? Like the freshly home made pasta?

 

[mish]

Mish, what did you mean by fresh pasta? Like the freshly home made pasta?

Don't know how to post double quotes. I like the way you think, Charlie. What I call using my noodle

I started a topic about fresh store-bought pasta sheets to get some input, since I've seen it mentioned in many recipes. Sorry I deleted it, but thought it should have a different discussion/topic.

 

[CharlieD]

Well, not sure what you are talking about but you can pretty much use anything in lasagna, even spaghety if that is all you have.

 

[BreezyCooking]

CharlieD - actually no, you can't just use "spaghetti" to make Lasagna.

The reason it's called "Lasagna" is because it uses "Lasagna" noodles. Just like a recipe calling for Farfalle uses Farfalle pasta; just like a recipe calling for Penne uses Penne pasta.

A baked pasta dish using "spaghetti" would be just that - a baked pasta dish using spaghetti. It wouldn't be "Lasagna".

 

[CharlieD]

BreezyCooking, You are just way too serious. Your handle doesn't suite you.