Delverde

Delverde is an Italian pasta maker, and the box states where the pasta is made: the Sansepolcro mill in Tuscany. The ingredient list is short, selected durum wheat semolina and water, which is what gives a dried sheet the bite it keeps after half an hour in the oven.

The lasagne sits in our pasta shelf, part of the snacks and noodles department. The sheets are flat and need no pre-cooking, so you skip the pan of water and the job of lifting hot sheets out of it one at a time.

Build the dish in alternating layers, sheet then sauce, and make sure every sheet is covered to the edges, because a dry corner standing proud of the sauce will bake hard. Thirty to thirty five minutes at 200 degrees is what the box gives. A ragu and bechamel is the usual filling, though the same sheets take a keema with a loose tomato sauce, or spinach and paneer, as long as the sauce is wet enough for the pasta to drink. Let the dish stand a few minutes before cutting so the layers hold together on the slice.

Keep the box somewhere cool and dry and fold the inner bag over once it is open, since dried sheets chip at the corners when they move about. The pasta contains wheat and may contain eggs, soy and mustard. For passata and chopped tomatoes to build the sauce, see tinned tomatoes.