Preparing lasagna: How to avoid time pressure

Lasagne goes down well with almost everyone and can be wonderfully prepared in several ways.

This makes it the perfect dish if you have guests or want to bring something yourself.

It is also worth preparing lasagne for your own use and storing it for later.

How can you prepare lasagna? Lasagne can be prepared 24 hours in advance, either pre-baked or unbaked, and stored in the fridge. You can also prepare just the béchamel, ragout or pasta dough and leave it in the fridge for a day. Alternatively, freeze the lasagne or ingredients and store for 1 to 2 months.

Here you can find out how I prefer to prepare my lasagne and what I need to bear in mind.

Preparing lasagna: All methods at a glance

If you are preparing lasagne for guests to save time, you have 4 options.

You can:

1. Coat the lasagne in the morning, keep in the fridge and bake in the evening
2. Coat and pre-bake the lasagne the day before, store in the fridge and bake the following day
3. Prepare the béchamel, the bolognese and, if necessary, the pasta dough and only coat and bake a day later
4. Coat the lasagne 2 to 3 days in advance, freeze and then bake

Here you can see the baking time for normal, chilled, pre-baked and frozen lasagne:

Condition of the lasagna	Baking time (standard lasagne recipe)
fresh	40 minutes at 180°C top and bottom heat
cooled	60 minutes at 180°C top and bottom heat
Pre-baked and cooled	20 minutes at 180°C top and bottom heat
deep-frozen	Defrost for 20 minutes at 120°C + bake for 25 minutes at 180°C

So you can save the most time if you pre-bake the lasagne, store it in the fridge and then put it in the oven to reheat.

With this method, the last layer of cheese is only added in the second baking unit. If the cheese is not quite melted to taste at the end of the baking time, it helps to switch on the grill mode for a few minutes.

Here you can see the shelf life of lasagna depending on the type of storage and method:

	At room temperature	In the fridge	In the freezer
Lasagne (fresh)	1 hour	4 – 6 hours	1 – 2 months
Lasagne (pre-baked)	1 hour	24 hours	1 – 2 months
Bechamel and bolognese (separate)	1 hour	24 hours	1 – 2 months
Pasta dough for lasagna	2 hours	24 hours	1 – 2 months

Now I’ll go into a little more detail about the different options and when I use them.

The best way to prepare lasagne (freeze the lasagne)

I prefer to freeze the lasagna for a few days.

This method offers several advantages:

• The lasagne can be stored for several days without losing its flavor
• I even store them for several months for my own use
• The lasagne sheets retain their consistency as they do not absorb the liquid from the filling
• I save space in my fridge

What is the best way to prepare lasagna? A good way to prepare lasagne is to coat it and freeze it. Lasagne will keep in the freezer for 2 to 3 days without any loss of quality. You can use it up within 2 months for your own consumption.

To ensure that the frozen lasagne keeps for a long time and is not affected by freezer burn, you need to freeze it correctly.

I’ll show you how I go about it:

How to freeze and defrost lasagne

1. Coat the lasagne, omitting the last layer of cheese
2. Cover the lasagna with aluminum foil and freeze in a freezer bag
3. Defrost the lasagne in the oven at 130 °C for at least 20 minutes
4. Sprinkle the lasagne with cheese and bake for at least 25 minutes at 180°C

The times may vary depending on the lasagne recipe. It is worth taking a look in the oven towards the end of the baking time to estimate the remaining baking time.

You can read more about freezing lasagna here.

Tip: I usually use the grill mode on my oven for the last few minutes. This makes the cheese layer particularly crispy.

Important: The lasagne should be frozen without the cheese layer, as it dries out in the freezer. The cheese layer should therefore only be applied after defrosting before the lasagne goes into the oven.

Prepare the lasagna a few hours in advance

If you only want to prepare lasagne a few hours in advance, it is not necessary to freeze it.

How do you prepare lasagna a few hours in advance? You can coat the lasagne a few hours in advance and keep it covered in the fridge. Alternatively, you can just prepare the béchamel and the ragout. The ingredients are also easier to coat when chilled. The baking time for chilled lasagne is extended by around 20 to 30 minutes.

It is always best to sprinkle the cheese over the lasagne just before it goes into the oven. It may also dry out a little in the fridge.

However, if the lasagna is only going to stay in the cooler for a few hours and you are forgetful like me, you can also add the cheese beforehand.

I would leave the lasagne freshly coated in the fridge for a maximum of 4 to 6 hours.

If the freshly coated lasagne is left in the fridge for too long, there is a risk that the pasta sheets will become soft as they absorb liquid.

You can easily avoid this by preparing the béchamel and the Bolognese ragout and storing them separately in the fridge. This way, you can even keep the ingredients for 24 hours without any problems.

The ingredients become firmer when chilled, which makes it a little easier to coat the lasagne.

But always remember to cover everything as airtight as possible with cling film. The right place for fresh ingredients or cooked dishes is always the top shelf in the fridge.

If you make your own lasagne sheets, you can also prepare the pasta dough.

You should not form the lasagne sheets themselves in advance, as they dry out quickly. However, you can prepare the pasta dough without any problems.

Pasta dough can be left at room temperature for 2 hours in an airtight container. You can keep the dough in the fridge for 24 hours. Just remember to take the dough out of the fridge at least 30 minutes before you use it.

Prepare the lasagna one day in advance

If you don’t have a freezer or can’t fit anything else in there, you can also leave lasagna in the fridge overnight.

The problem is that the pasta sheets become too soft for my taste.

Fortunately, there are 2 ways to prevent this.

How do you prepare lasagna a day in advance? Lasagne can be prepared up to 24 hours in advance and stored covered in the fridge. You can prevent the pasta sheets from becoming soft by pre-cooking them for 1 to 2 minutes and pre-baking the lasagne (without cheese) for about 20 minutes. Alternatively, you can store the bolognese and béchamel separately.

The best way to avoid soft pasta sheets is to keep the ingredients for the lasagna separately in the fridge. However, if this is not time-saving enough, there is no getting around coating the lasagne in advance.

If the lasagne is left in the fridge long enough in this way, the pasta sheets will soak up a lot of liquid from the filling and become soggy.

This mainly applies to homemade and fresh lasagne sheets. With dried and store-bought lasagne sheets, this problem does not exist and the following steps are not necessary.

If you store lasagne in the fridge for more than 6 hours, you should:

• Pre-cook the homemade lasagne sheets for 1 to 2 minutes
• Pre-bake the lasagne in the oven at 160°C for 20 minutes (without cheese)
• Only apply the last layer of cheese afterwards

By pre-cooking the lasagne sheets, they soak up a little water in advance so that they absorb less of the filling in the fridge. Pre-cooking the lasagne sheets is often a good idea anyway, for reasons I explain in the linked article.

Pre-baking has the effect of making the lasagne and the filling more stable overall. This also means that less of the liquid is transferred to the pasta sheets. The second advantage is that it saves even more time. Pre-baked lasagne only needs a maximum of 20 minutes in the oven afterwards.

Before you put the lasagne in the oven, you must of course not forget the cheese. The cheese can go in the fridge for less than 4 hours, beyond that it may lose quality and become dry. As the last layer of cheese is so important for a successful lasagne, I would always add it before putting it in the oven.

Prepare lasagna several days in advance

If you want to keep the lasagna for longer than 24 hours, you will need to freeze it.

I have already shown you how easy it is at the beginning of this article. Here I want to show you another way to get everything out of your freezer.

Instead of freezing the lasagne, you can also make the bolognese and béchamel in large quantities and freeze them separately.

This may not be the best method for visitors, but you can save a lot of time with this approach for your own use.

The thing is:

You should take plenty of time to make a good Bolognese. The longer you let it simmer, the better the consistency. However, it is very easy to make in large quantities. All you need is a large pan.

You can therefore make more Bolognese without any extra effort and keep some of it for a later dish (doesn’t necessarily have to be lasagne).

The same applies to béchamel, of course. Although it is quicker to make, it is laborious to prepare. If you have made too much, you can also simply freeze the béchamel sauce.

Prepare lasagne variations

The previous assumptions apply to all possible lasagne variations. In some cases, however, there are special things to consider:

How can you prepare vegetarian lasagna? As vegetarian lasagne usually contains spinach and other watery ingredients, it is best to freeze it immediately. The pasta sheets will become soggy after several hours in the fridge. Spinach lasagne should not be pre-baked, as this increases the nitrate content. A high nitrate content is dangerous for babies!

How can you prepare lasagna with fish? Lasagne with fish should be kept in the fridge for a maximum of one day or frozen for several days. If you have pre-baked lasagne with fish, you should serve it the next day at the latest.

Warming up lasagne

How do you reheat frozen lasagne? Frozen lasagne can be defrosted overnight in the fridge or defrosted for 20 minutes at 120 °C top and bottom heat and then baked at 180 °C for 25 minutes. After defrosting, cover the lasagne with plenty of cheese before putting it back in the oven.

How do you reheat lasagna from the fridge? Chilled lasagne needs about 20 minutes in the oven. With a normal baking time of 40 minutes, the baking time for chilled lasagne is around 60 minutes at 180 °C top and bottom heat.

How do you reheat pre-baked lasagne? If the lasagne is pre-baked, it only needs 20 minutes in the oven at 180 °C top and bottom heat. The last layer of cheese must be applied shortly before this. For the best result, the grill mode can be switched on for the last few minutes of the baking time.

More about lasagne

• Lasagne Bolognese (original recipe from Bologna)
• Creamy béchamel for lasagne (simple recipe)
• Lasagne side dishes: 21 delicious accompaniments
• 10+ wines to go with lasagna (with explanation)
• Store the Bolognese: How to preserve the taste
• Lasagne baking time & temperature: how to prevent it from drying out
• Do you have to pre-cook lasagne sheets? (Instructions in 4 steps)