Pre-cooked and half-prepared Lasagna
Pre-cooked Lasagna:
Pasta is a food with efficient and useful nutritional value. Because this food is basically carbohydrate which is the base value of the grain food, it stands on the basis of the food pyramid. This indicates its high proportion in supplying necessary daily energy.
Pasta is superior to other products such as rice and bread in that it contains complex carbohydrates ( 55-60% of daily quota of carbohydrates in individuals’ daily diet, one should not consume over 15-20% of simple carbohydrates and the rest is required to be derived from complex carbohydrates). Since it contains a lower glycemic indexcompared to these materials, it prevents a drastic rise in blood sugar by having a gradual effect. In addition, it delays saturation feeling and muscle fuel for a longer time.
These products are divided into three groups of “Filled”, “Hollow”, and “Roll or Strip” each of which may be simple ( plain) or a blend of many food materials.
Lasagna
It is a kind of pasta in thin sheets with 1-2 millimeters thickness, 20-30 cm length. It is widened and formed with flour (semolina) blend, water, and pressured water. It is also dried under certain circumstances.
Ingredients:
Lasagna is basically derived from water and flour (semolina). To make special lasagna, the additives can elevate its taste, shape, and nutritional value. The most important additives are egg, vitamins, protein, minerals, etc.
Production of Pre-cooked Lasagna:
First the required flour (semolina flour) is blended with the required blend(egg, colorful vegetable powder) if necessary. It is then transmitted to control sieve by spirals. After it is sieved, flour blend and other additives go to “press stage” by blower. It is blended with water by three vacuum mixers and forms dough, it is then extruded and passes the bar. After passing the “bar”, the produced dough is formed as a sheet (typical lasagna) and then it goes to hot water tank after the thickness is arranged. In this stage, dough sheet gets the initial cooking by hot water in which gelatination takes place.
Then dough exits the tank and gets washed by some nozzles. By its arrival to the drier, by passing the sticker, lasagna dough changes from flat to serrated one and enters the drier.
Drying process is done by the direct heat from burning natural gas. Next, the dried product is transmitted to cooler and then to cutting stage. There, lasagna sheets are cut from length and width considering their weight, and then they get prepared to be packed. In packing stage, the sheets being cut are first put in cellophane and are packed into cartons, then after being labeled on the cartons, they are collected on palettes.
Recipe of Lasagna:
You may have spent a long time in the kitchen to make a delicious food such as lasagna, but finally the mess exhausts you and sometimes only in certain cases with long intervals, by the kids’ insistence on making it, you are willing to make it. With its quick and easy cooking method, you can easily make delicious lasagna in short compared to its other cooking methods.
The ingredients used in lasagna layers are prepared (ground meat, grated onion, carrot, minced mushroom, oregano powder, minced green pepper, tomato paste, salt, pepper, and turmeric fried together).
Finally, add one glass of water to the ingredients and put it aside so that it boils for a while.
The part in which most women have problem is boiling lasagna and laying it layers on cloth that is sometimes followed by breaking, sticking and getting mashed (typical lasagna). It is easier and simpler to use precooked lasagna which does not need to be boiled or dried so that you make the bottom of Pyrex or Teflon greasy by liquid oil and put lasagna layers together, then pour some of the ingredients on them. Also you can pour a little mayonnaise on them, then another layer of lasagna, then ingredients, next mayonnaise and finally pour grated cheese on top of all ingredients, then add 2 to 3 glasses of milk to the dish, finally put the top. In case the dish does not have the top, you can use aluminum foil or clean coverings to cover it. Put the dish on the top floor of the oven with the lowest temperature. If there is no oven, you can put it on the cooker (burner) and make sure to use flame-spread on a low temperature. Depending on the oven’s temperatures, you can wait for 30 to 45 minutes to get it prepared. If you feel it is not ready yet, you can have the previous temperature and wait until it gets soft and cooked.
Advantages of Pre-cooked Lasagna:
1) Considering its dimensions which are wider as well as its waves’ shape, its placement in the dish, also the sauce preservation is better than other lasagna with other forms.
2) Having special spice inside lasagna packs
3) Having various instructions in the packs to prepare this product
4) Because it is cooked in the process, it does not need to be recooked so the time required to be ready is reduced by 50%
5) Under similar circumstances, pre-cooked lasagna has better properties regarding texture and toughness compared to non-gelatined lasagna for its superficial gelatination
6) Due to supplying modern production technology in drying this product, there will be less mineral and organic loss and more nutritional value.
7) Drying by infra-red system improves its appearance properties, makes the surface of lasagna shiny and improves the color of the dried product.
8) Protein’s biologic value is a key factor in identifying qualitative and quantitative conditions of protein. Thus, consuming this product preserves biologic value of proteins and improves digestion and absorption property.
9) using infra-red drying system increases fiber contents and starch resistance to enzymes ( in addition to causing saturation feeling for having complex carbohydrates, fibers decline received calorie as well as obesity. The starch resistant to digestive enzymes do not get digested and absorbed, also they aggravate fiber effect.
