Emu Lasagne

Yesterday, our friend's son was in a swimming meet at a pool very close to our place, so we invited the family over for lunch.

Several days earlier, I found out that a good meal for competitive swimmers would have lots of carbo, lean protein and vegetables. Thus the menu for Saturday's lunch was Emu & Vegetable Lasagne and Garlic Bread.

As I've already covered garlic bread in the last post, I'll focus on how to make the lasagne this time . . .

For those who might not know what Emu is, it's a large flightless bird that is found in Australia. It's meat is very lean, and looks similar to beef or venison. We were actually out shopping for venison the other day, and picked up a pack of emu by mistake and did not realize it till I inspected it in our freezer a few days later.

Instead of chopping up the meat, I decided to slice it up into short thin strips so that we will be able to chew into the Emu and enjoy it more when we eat the lasagne. Marinaded it with a generous amount of red wine, freshly ground black pepper and rosemary before cooking it with onions, garlic, half a bottle of cheese & mushroom pasta sauce and some milk.

For the vegetables, we used carrots, eggplant, mushrooms and tomatoes cooked in the other half bottle of pasta sauce, milk and some pepper & herbs.

We used Instant Lasagne sheets to help quickly assemble our meal in a large casserole dish. To make it easier to cut and shape the instant lasagne sheets, soak them in warm water for several minutes first.

Spread olive oil and a bit of butter on the base and sides of the dish and place a layer of lasagne sheets on the bottom, then pour in the emu and spread it out to form the next layer. Sprinkle a layer of shredded cheese over the emu before adding the second layer of lasagne sheets. Now pour in the vegetables and spread it out evenly; layer on the shredded cheese and place the final layer of lasagne sheets. Spread some butter over the top layer and spoon in a thin layer of milk to completely cover the surface of the lasagne sheets; sprinkle some herbs to top it off.

Bake it in the oven for 30 - 45 minutes; then let it stand for 15 minutes, and grill for 10 minutes to achieve a nice golden brown finish.

The Emu Lasagne went well, accompanied by a nice bottle of red wine - Chateauneuf du Pape 2007