Cannelloni

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This is ideal as an entrée (one or two cannelloni per person) or as a main, depending on the size of your appetite! Dried cannelloni are a little fiddly to use, so we’ve used fresh lasagne pasta sheets. They can be cut to size and they also cook through in a matter of minutes.

Prep: 10 mins

Cook: 50 mins

Serves 4

Excellent source of iron

Ingredients

250g Quality Mark beef mince
1 onion, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, crushed
400g can diced tomatoes
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1 tablespoon dried lemon thyme
250g ricotta or cottage cheese
½ cup grated Parmesan
handful fresh basil leaves, finely chopped
2 large fresh lasagne sheets, cut into 6 even pieces

Cheese sauce

2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon flour
1 cup milk
½ cup grated Parmesan

Method

Preheat oven to 180°C.

Fry onion in a dash of oil until soft and transparent. Add mince and brown well, ensuring that you break up any large pieces. Add garlic, tomatoes and dried herbs and stir well. Remove from heat and leave to cool.

Mix ricotta with the first measure of Parmesan cheese and half of the fresh basil. Season with salt and pepper, then combine with cooled mince mixture. Oil a baking dish and take a few spoonfuls of mixture to dot around the baking dish.

Take a sheet of pasta and dot spoonfuls of the mixture along one edge, and roll over to form a loose tube shape. Place tube in the baking dish and repeat until all pasta sheets are used and baking dish is full.

If you have leftover mixture, keep it warm and use to line your plates when serving up, or if you’d rather not, simply spoon over the cannelloni in the baking dish. Brush cannelloni with olive oil and bake for 10–15 minutes until golden.

While baking cannelloni, make a light cheese sauce. In a pan melt butter, then stir in flour to make a paste. Add milk and stir with a whisk until well combined. Add cheese and stir over a gentle heat until sauce is thickened and smooth. If you’d like to thin the sauce a little, simply add a little more milk and stir until combined.

Serve cannelloni on individual plates, drizzled with cheese sauce and garnished with remaining fresh basil.

^{Copyright Notice

An extract from Minced with photography by Alan Gillard. Published by Penguin Group NZ. Copyright © Sue Hamilton and Dana Alexander, 2010. RRP $35.00. Available at all good booksellers nationwide.}

Suitable Cuts
Nutrition

BEEF OR LAMB MINCE

Nutrition Information Per Serving

Serving size: 476g

Energy kJ (kcal)	2500 (597)
Protein (g)	42.8
Fat (g)	26.6
Saturated (g)	16.1
Carbohydrate (g)	46.0
Sugars (g)	9.4
Sodium (mg)	579
Iron (mg)	5.9
Zinc (mg)	6.3
Vitamin B12 (ug)	2.7
Vitamin D (ug)	0.8
Selenium (ug)	10.1