Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Lasagna: simple, yet amazing!


This is a family recipe. I have tried to modify it in the past by adding spinach and/or other veggies, but nothing is as good as the original. Since veggies are good for you (you should be eating 5 servings per day!), please serve them on the side! This recipe easily feeds 3, possibly even 4 people. We have 2 small baking dishes, so I always make a gluten-free one with meat for Mark and a whole-wheat one without meat for me. The picture is of Mark's meat one.

Ingredients:

  • Lasagna sheets (preferably organic whole wheat, or use gluten-free if you have Coeliac like Mark)
  • ~ 400 g (14 oz) shredded Mozzarella cheese
  • Freshly grated Parmesan cheese (please, no dried crap!)
  • 500 g (~18 oz) Ricotta cheese (yes, you need this much for such a little lasagna!)
  • Marinara sauce (you can use meat sauce if you must)
What you do:

  1. Preheat oven to 190 C (375 F) and cook the pasta sheets if they aren't instant.
  2. In a small (8 x 8 inches), square glass baking dish (if you want to use the large one, you need to double the recipe), spoon sauce in the bottom of the pan (to prevent the noodles from sticking)
  3. Lay down one layer of noodles (if you are using the instant kind, be aware that these noodles will grow during the baking!)
  4. Layer in this order: ricotta (a thick layer of this is best), mozzarella, parmesan cheeses
  5. Spoon marinara sauce over the cheeses
  6. Lay lasagna noodles on top of the marinara sauce
  7. Spoon more marinara over the noodles and repeat until done (sauce, noodles, sauce, cheeses, sauce, noodles, sauce, cheeses, ....)
  8. End with the cheese layer
  9. Bake in hot oven for 40 mins or until bubbly (I like to cover with foil first and half way through remove the foil)
*note: you can freeze either before baking or after

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