I was first introduced to canelones as a kid growing up, when we had these close family friends who were originally from Barcelona, Spain. Their father would spend all day over the weekend making canelones, and would once in a while invite us over for dinner. I remember never having tasted anything like it! They are basically sheets of lasagna that are rolled up around your filling of choice.
Part of what I was enjoying at the time and didn’t realize it was this beautiful, smooth bechamel sauce that accompanied the canelones before they go into the oven to bake—the sauce melds with the canelone filling, resulting in an incredibly rich dish that is worth writing home about.
For the noodles here, you can cut lasagna sheets in half, because all you need to roll one canelone is a piece of lasagna noodle that is roughly 4 inches by 6 inches. I would recommend adding at least two layers of rolled canelones, or about 16-20.
Beef and Mushroom Canelones
I was first introduced to canelones as a kid growing up, when we had these close family friends who were originally from Barcelona, Spain. Their father would spend all day over the weekend making canelones, and would once in a while invite us over for dinner. I remember never having tasted anything like it! They are basically sheets of lasagna that are rolled up around your filling of choice.Part of what I was enjoying at the time and didn’t realize it was this beautiful, smooth bechamel sauce that accompanied the canelones before they go into the oven to bake—the sauce melds with the canelone filling, resulting in an incredibly rich dish that is worth writing home about.For the noodles here, you can cut lasagna sheets in half, because all you need to roll one canelone is a piece of lasagna noodle that is roughly 4 inches by 6 inches. I would recommend adding at least two layers of rolled canelones, or about 16-20.
Ingredients
For the Canelones and Filling:
- 3 Tbsp vegetable oil
- 32 oz 2 lbs ground beef
- 2 white onions (small dice)
- 32 oz 2 lbs mushrooms, small dice
- 1 tsp Kosher salt
- ½ tsp granulated garlic
- ½ tsp dried oregano
- ¼ tsp red pepper flakes
- 1 cup chopped parsley
- 2 cups whole milk
- 1 cup white wine
- 1 cup tomato puree
- Kosher salt & freshly-ground black pepper (to taste)
- 16-20 dried lasagna sheets that are 4”x6”
- 1 Tbsp olive oil
For the Bechamel Sauce:
- 3 Tbsp butter
- 3 Tbsp all-purpose flour
- 2 cups whole milk
- ¼ tsp Kosher salt (or more to taste)
- A few grinds of fresh black pepper
- A tiny sprinkle (less than ¼ tsp ground nutmeg)
Instructions
For the Canelones and Filling:
- Heat the vegetable oil in a large soup pot or heavy-bottomed Dutch oven.
- When the oil is hot, sear the ground beef over high heat for roughly three minutes.
- Add the diced white onions and mushrooms, along with the Kosher salt, granulated garlic, dried oregano, red pepper flakes, and chopped parsley.
- Stir until the ingredients are mixed, and cook over medium heat for roughly ten minutes.
- Add the two cups of whole milk, and cook the mixture down until the milk is almost completely evaporated.
- *This step can take over an hour.
- Add the white wine, and cook until the wine is almost evaporated, or roughly one more hour.
- Add the tomato puree, and cook for another two hours, or until the mixture has achieved the desired flavor.
- *If your filling gets too dry at this stage, you can add a bit of water and continue cooking.
- Taste, and season again with Kosher salt and freshly-ground black pepper, if needed.
- When you are ready to assemble your canelones, boil your pasta sheets, or leave them in a dish with boiling water and some olive oil (where the oil helps to prevent the sheets from sticking together).
- When the pasta sheets have softened, add a bit of filling to each one, and roll them up into logs.
- When your canelones are rolled, make sure your bechamel sauce is ready.
For the Bechamel Sauce:
- *While you are cooking down the beef and mushroom filling, you can prepare your bechamel sauce.
- To make bechamel, add the butter to a medium-sized nonstick sauté pan, and increase the heat to medium-high.
- When the butter is melted, add the all-purpose flour and stir the flour and butter together with a rubber spatula until they combine and form a paste, also known as a roux.
- Cook the roux over medium-high heat while stirring frequently with a rubber spatula.
- When the roux begins to smell toasted, or after roughly five minutes of cooking, you can begin to slowly whisk in the whole milk into the roux.
- Continue to slowly whisk in the milk in stages, smoothing out the contents with your rubber spatula once in a while to get everything evenly mixed.
- When the bechamel is completely smooth, season with Kosher salt, freshly-ground black pepper, and a small pinch of ground nutmeg.
- Preheat your oven to 350˚F.
- When your bechamel sauce is ready, add one third of the sauce to the bottom of an oven-safe casserole dish.
- Arrange the rolled canelones from earlier in the casserole dish, stacking them in multiple layers.
- Pour the remaining two thirds of the bechamel sauce on top of the rolled canelones.
- Bake in the oven at 350˚F for roughly 35 minutes, and then remove from the oven and allow the contents to cool for a minute or two at room temperature.
- Serve while the canelones are still hot!
Notes
Don’t worry if your bechamel sauce here isn’t completely smooth—people won’t be able to tell after it spends time baking in the oven and mixing with the other ingredients.