Gousto is a meal delivery service that curates recipes and sends recipe cards with pre-portioned ingredients directly to your door.

Gousto is one of several meal delivery companies who draw upon disruptive technologies to change the way we buy food. It focuses on providing organic ingredients and high-welfare meat in combination with healthier recipes. Here at Season’s Eatings we trialled one of their meal options to see how it works.

We chose a spinach & veggie mince lasagne recipe for two people, with the full ingredients and recipe below. All the key ingredients are provided, with a list of the typical store cupboard ingredients Gousto anticipate you will have yourself, in this case: butter, flour, oil, salt and pepper. The only minor critique we had, was the number of lasagne sheets was rather ungenerous. Other than that, the recipe was easy to follow, and full of flavour.

Preparation & cooking time: 55 minutes

Ingredients:

• 40g Irish mature cheddar
• 2 garlic cloves
• 2 tbsp Henderson’s relish
• 1 red onion
• 150g baby spinach
• 1 tbsp tomato ketchup
• 2 tbsp tomato paste
• 1 vegetable stock cube
• 45g meat-free mince
• 6-8 lasagne sheets
• 1 tsp dried Oregano
• 1 tbsp baharat

Recipe:

1. Pre-heat the oven to 200ºC. Peel and finely dice the red onion and garlic. 
2. Heat a large, wide-based pan with a drizzle of olive oil. Add the onion, and a pinch of salt and cook over a low heat for 10 minutes until softened and starting to brown. Meanwhile dissolve the vegetable stock cubes in the boiled water and stir in the meat-free mince.
3. Add 30g of butter to a pan, and melt over a medium heat. Add 30g flour and stir for 2-3 minutes until a sandy paste (roux) has formed.
4. Gradually whisk in 200ml of milk into the roux. Whisk constantly for 5 minutes or until a smooth, thick sauce remains. Grate in the cheddar cheese, stir until smooth – this is the béchamel sauce. 
5. Add the chopped garlic, baharat and tomato paste to the softened onion and stir for a further 2 minutes. Add the soaked mince-free mince (including stock), Henderson’s relish, tomato ketchup and season with salt and pepper. Cook for 2 minutes until warmed through, then add 50ml of water – the mixture should be quite wet.
6. Wash the baby spinach, then add a quarter of it to the bottom of an oven-proof dish. Add a third of the mince mixture, then one layer of lasagne sheets. Repeat the spinach, mince, pasta sheets twice more, so that you have three layers in total. 
7. Pour over béchamel sauce and sprinkle with dried oregano. Bake for 20 – 30 minutes, until golden and cooked through. 
8. Serve with the leftover spinach.