Since this has such a long cooking time I suggest making the full amount of ragu but, if you want to halve this, feel free to you will need half of all ingredients down to the lasagne sheets although may need all of the stock, you want the meat to have liquid up to about half way.  The cooking time won’t change.

Ingredients
3 tbsps oil
2½ kg beef shin or beef short ribs
500g frozen soffritto
5g fresh oregano
5g fresh sage
2 bay leaves
30g anchovies, drained and chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
2 tbsp tomato puree
3 tbsp Calabrian chilli paste
300ml red wine
2 x 400g tinned pulped or crushed tomatoes
½ tbsp sugar
300ml beef stock
Salt
Pepper
250g lasagne sheets
425ml whole milk
50g unsalted butter
50g plain flour
75g parmesan
75g cheddar

Equipment needed
Large casserole dish with a lid
1 sheet of baking paper
20 - 23cm square oven dish

Method
Into a large casserole dish, put the oil and over a high heat and brown the shin (or ribs) on all sides.  Remove the beef from the pot to one side and add the soffritto herbs. Cook for around 10 minutes until the vegetables are soft and just starting to go golden.  Add the anchovies and garlic, stir through and cook for 2 minutes, stirring.

Preheat your oven to 160c.

Add the tomato puree and chilli paste to the pan and cook for a minute or two to remove the raw tomato taste then add the wine and cook for 5 minutes until bubbling and much of the liquid has evaporated.  Add the tomatoes, sugar and beef stock and stir.  Check the seasoning and add some salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Put the beef shin back in and push into the liquid, pouring in any resting juices.  Take some baking paper and put over the liquid, I find scrunching it up then pushing it on top works best.  Top with the lid and put into the oven for 3-4 hours until the meat is very ender - you want to be able to ‘pull’ the beef. Leave to one side for 10 minutes as it will be extremely hot.

Remove the herbs and discard.  Carefully take the beef out of the liquid and remove the bone.  If there is any marrow then carefully with a knife, pull it out and put into the liquid.  Using 2 forks, shred the beef, discarding any sinew you come across. Remove half of the liquid to a jug.  Put the meat into the sauce, stirring it and topping up with the reserved liquid as needed.  I usually find I need most of it but you don’t want it to be too wet - this is a ragu rather than a stew.  Make sure you add the beef back as you shred it to prevent it drying out.  Check the seasoning and adjust if needed.

Meanwhile, to make your béchamel put the butter into a small pan and melt over a medium high heat.  When the butter has melted, add the flour and vigorously stir until the butter has incorporated and then keep cooking and stirring for another minute.  Slowly add your milk a bit at a time, stirring to ensure there are no lumps as you go.  Leave the sauce to cook on a low heat for 5 minutes.  Turn off the heat, add the cheese and stir until melted.  Check the seasoning of both your cheese sauce and your beef ragu and adjust where necessary.

Before assembling, remove the pasta sheets from the packet and work out how many sheets you need per layer for your dish. We are aiming for 4 layers of ragu, 4 layers of pasta and a layer of cheese, you may need to cut your sheets to fit.

Remove half of the beef and put into the fridge or freezer for another day.  Of the remaining ragu, take my spoon and ‘divide’ the sauce in the pan into 4 so you know how much sauce to use per layer.

In your oven dish, add a quarter of the ragu and evenly spread over the bottom of your dish and top with a layer of the pasta sheets. Repeat 3 more times, ending with a layer of pasta.  Cover with the cheese sauce.

Put into the oven and bake for 30-45 minutes until golden brown and bubbling.