Here is the recipe.
Here is the finished product:
This recipe was a good starting point, but really needed some jazzing up. I mean, the only spices in this were garlic, salt, and pepper. As you well know, I love garlic, but this needed more. I added some onion powder, basil, sugar, and fennel seed to the sauce. I highly recommend fennel seed, it's what gives Italian sausage its flavor, and goes really well in tomato sauce. I also added spinach for more veggies, and sausage for more protein.
I varied the cheeses. It called for ricotta, mozzarella, and parmesan, but because we're a cheddar family, I did half mozzarella and half cheddar. I interspersed some of the cheddar through the lasagna, and put the last on top with the mozzarella and parmesan.
It all turned out really well, and I think it would have been somewhat disappointing if I hadn't made any modifications. Like the pizza frittata, all the cheddar on top let out a lot of oil, so I used a paper towel again to soak it up (though because of the cheddar in the layers, it was still kind of oily). My only complaint is that the sauce was pretty runny, even though I simmered it for twice as long as called for, it still remained pretty liquid-y. Maybe adding some tomato paste and simmering longer would have helped,
Husband liked it a lot (it had so much cheese, it would be hard NOT to like it). He's been resisting seconds for health reasons, but caved on this one because it was really tasty. Baby also downed it, so overall I'd say this was a success. I think I prefer the other lasagna recipe I do (which is the one that gave me the idea for the fennel seeds), but this one was pretty tasty too.
Here is the finished product:
This recipe was a good starting point, but really needed some jazzing up. I mean, the only spices in this were garlic, salt, and pepper. As you well know, I love garlic, but this needed more. I added some onion powder, basil, sugar, and fennel seed to the sauce. I highly recommend fennel seed, it's what gives Italian sausage its flavor, and goes really well in tomato sauce. I also added spinach for more veggies, and sausage for more protein.
I varied the cheeses. It called for ricotta, mozzarella, and parmesan, but because we're a cheddar family, I did half mozzarella and half cheddar. I interspersed some of the cheddar through the lasagna, and put the last on top with the mozzarella and parmesan.
It all turned out really well, and I think it would have been somewhat disappointing if I hadn't made any modifications. Like the pizza frittata, all the cheddar on top let out a lot of oil, so I used a paper towel again to soak it up (though because of the cheddar in the layers, it was still kind of oily). My only complaint is that the sauce was pretty runny, even though I simmered it for twice as long as called for, it still remained pretty liquid-y. Maybe adding some tomato paste and simmering longer would have helped,
Husband liked it a lot (it had so much cheese, it would be hard NOT to like it). He's been resisting seconds for health reasons, but caved on this one because it was really tasty. Baby also downed it, so overall I'd say this was a success. I think I prefer the other lasagna recipe I do (which is the one that gave me the idea for the fennel seeds), but this one was pretty tasty too.
whole tomatoes chopped up into a sauce. I actually used scissors to "chop" the tomatoes up, rather than food processing them. It said to process it chunky, so making them into small pieces with scissors worked fine. To be honest, I wanted to use the food processor to shred the cheese, and I didn't want to wash it.
browning sausage
adding spices, spinach, and sausage to the sauce
creating the ricotta mixture
layering the lasagna
topping with mozzarella, cheddar, and parmesan
finished lasagna
cut into lasagna. had to use a spoon since it's nonstick. It might have been a cleaner cut with a knife, but it was juicy either way, so maybe not
slice of lasagna
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