Thursday, January 7, 2010

Lasagna!


As usual, I was hungry...I should have baked this a little longer!






Did anyones Grandma say "We are going to have EYETALYAN for dinner"? It can be strange what you can remember from your childhood. Onto the food! When I make lasagna I go big! I make a big pot of red sauce and refrigerate it over night. The next day, I get down to business! I buy 2 throw away foil lasagna pans. I usually bake one and freeze an unbaked pan for later.

First, the red sauce:
4 cans of diced tomatoes with Italian spices
3 tablespoons of dried basil
1 large roll of ground beef- browned
2 Spanish onions- browned
1 package of fresh mushrooms- browned
3 Cubanelle peppers or red, yellow, stop light- Guess, browned with the meat!
3 cloves of garlic- smashed, crushed and utterly pulverize! --a micro plane will due!
6 large cans of tomato sauce
1 carrot grated- on a micro plane for sweetness
2 tablespoons of dried red pepper flakes
3 cups of red wine! I use the cheap stuff, Cabernet.

Brown the meat with a good amount of kosher salt and fresh pepper. Add everything else and let simmer!

2 boxes of lasagna noodles- cook per instructions on the box
2 containers of ricotta cheese
1 block cream cheese - softened
4 eggs
2 tablespoons of dried Italian spices
( mix all the cheeses and eggs together)
4 zucchinis- grated on box grater
1 to 2 bags of fresh baby spinach
3 bags of mozzarella cheese
1 cup of Parmesan cheese
This is a pic of the lasagna before baking! Cook noodles per instructions on the box. Rinse with cold water. Put some red sauce in bottom of the pan. Put one layer of noodles in pan. Take your cheese/egg mixture and drop 1/4 cup size spoonfuls on the noodles. Take 1 zucchini and grate it onto the cheese mixture. Scatter the spinach on top of this mixture!Build another noodle layer and cover with red sauce and sprinkle cheese all over. Repeat this until you reach 4 layers, ending with red sauce and cheese. Bake on 350 cover with aluminum foil. Around 1 hour uncover and bake until golden brown. I wanted to say to make this even more special. I have used fresh spinach sprinkled in with the zucchini. Remember, you can ROCK THAT PLATE!

1 comment:

Chris said...

I haven't tried zucchini in lasagna before but I can see how it would work out.