The first BBQ with Beer Challenge is here! My wife challenged me to BBQ a lasagne! Never fearing a ridiculous challenge, and also seeing a good chance to drink some beer, well… Challenge Accepted.

Considering that I was just going to treat the BBQ as an oven, this wasn’t that far out in left field. But getting the temperature to hold, and not to burn the base would be, well, interesting.

Prep

1. Make a lasagne. (Instructions elsewhere). Ours was in a thick glass dish.

The Cook

1. Pre-heat to 350°. The trick, of course, will be trying to hold this temperature. If you don’t trust your BBQ thermostat, I was floating between medium and medium-low after the grill had heated up.
2. Open your beer. Put on the lasagne and close the top.
3. For the first beer you will just be controlling your temperature. Don’t be to gentle with it; keep some heat on directly underneath the pan to boil off the water in the sauce. Keep the sides on to get a nice oven effect.
4. On your second beer, check at around the 1/2 label mark. If the cheese isn’t bubbling or browning, you’re good to keep cruising.
5. When you are done your second beer, you should be close to finished. The cheese should be browned and bubbly. If not, increase your heat and monitor closely, because it will be soon.

You have now just BBQ’d a lasagne!

Total Beers: 2

Note: I have to admit this was not a complete success for me. I was too gentle on the heat underneath the pan, and the sauce didn’t boil enough - as a result, we had a very watery lasagne. It still tasted good - but I can do better. Also, I wanted to get more of a smokey flavour into the cheese; and perhaps because I was too scared of burning it, well, that didn’t happen. But learn from me! Don’t be too gentle on the heat, and it should be perfect! And let me know if you get some smokey flavour to work.

I’ll definitely try this again. Happy drinking and BBQ’ing!

Note II: not responsible for blackened, broken lazagne cooking pans. If you are worried, you can try a foil pan.