Tags
blogging 101, cat, comfort food, cooking, CSA, easy, family, grandma's, lasagna, sphinx
So I mostly made this recipe up, it is basically lasagna with filleted, grilled zucchini instead of lasagna noodles. It is a hybrid between something I briefly saw on the Food Network and the lasagna recipe that my grandma used to make for my mom back in the day. So, since I pulled this one out of nowhere, the ingredients list might be a little campy. I apologize for that, but if yours doesn’t turn out exactly like mine you can pass your version of the recipe down to your kids/grandkids as your family lasagna recipe. (LOL)
So here we go, I sure hope you can follow along 🙂
Ingredients:
5 medium Zucchini
24oz of cottage cheese
16oz bag of frozen spinach
25oz jar of spaghetti sauce
8oz shredded mozzarella cheese
1/3c grated parmesan
Part 1: Prepping the Zucchini
So I filleted the zucchinis and then I grilled them so they wouldn’t have to cook with the lasagna. One thing this does is that it takes some of the water out of the zucchini before you put it in the lasagna. If I were to use raw zucchini it would make the lasagna very wet; yuck. So grill/roast the zucchini before hand.
To fillet the zucchini, consult another website. I mean it. I got one or two nice pieces. Basically what it means is to cut the zucchini into ¼ inch pieces along the length of the zucchini. I failed, I am not going to pretend that I am some master chef and this is one of the moments my novice showed through. I maybe got one or two successful filets of zucchini. So I will not be displaying any pictures of me filleting, or give any advice. The only thing I will say is that I totally botched the zucchini but the lasagna still tasted great and looked pretty good! So don’t worry if you are in the same boat as me. (LOL)
Now to the grilling, this part I can do! So just take a brush and apply olive oil to both sides of the zucchini slices. If you want to add a little oomph you could add some garlic to the oil and brush that on.
Next, throw them on the grill. My grill got to about 315. Then cook the zucchini for 5-7 minutes on both sides. You might need to shift them around as they cook. I know my grill has some spots that cook way better than others so I made sure each piece had its time in the sweet spot.
I did a few batches on the grill and then I placed them on a plate and covered them in foil to keep any bugs or stuff out.
Part 2: Assembling the Lasagna.
So right as I was about to begin these steps my phone died… oops. So I will take it upon myself to use vividly descriptive language to make sure your lasagna is every bit as delicious as mine.
So the first thing you have to do is take the spinach out of the freezer and de-frost it. After the spinach is not frozen anymore, use a scissors to cut the spinach into smaller pieces.
Then, combine the spinach and cottage cheese in a bowl. I am told that most people use ricotta cheese in their lasagna. There is some story about why we use cottage cheese. I think it has something to do with my uncle being super picky when he was a kid and my grandma accommodating that. Not really sure. I’m sure I will have a few family members commenting with the CORRECT story so check back if you are curious. (LOL)
Next, take out your favorite lasagna pan (please use your favorite pan because one of the key ingredients in this recipe is love). Then start by layering the bottom of the pan with a layer of zucchini. My zucchini were very strange and crooked because I got them in our CSA box, so I had to fill in some holes with smaller pieces on the bottom. After that put a layer of the spinach-cottage cheese mixture over the zucchini. Then put a layer of sauce on top of that. My mom always uses Newman’s Own Sockarooni sauce because it has a little spice. If you want to get even fancier, you can put some fully cooked ground Italian sausage in with the sauce layer. I like it with spicy sausage, just a recommendation J. Cover the sauce layer with another zucchini layer and then repeat the spinach-cottage cheese layer and the sauce layer and the zucchini layer. You can repeat that as many times as you have space/ingretients for. I ran out of space after two repetitions. After you are at the top do another sauce layer and cover it with a generous helping of mozzarella cheese. Before you bake sprinkle the Parmesan cheese on top.
Bake the lasagna at 415 for 30-35 minutes, until the cheese is brown and bubbly.
After that, call everyone you love to the table and dig in. Since my mom and my sister are gone it was just my dad, Mowgli and me at the table. We let Mowgli sit in a chair but we did not share any of the food with him. (I have to add that so my mom won’t call me and yell at me for feeding Mowgli dairy (LOL)).
I prepared the lasagna ahead of time, as usual. And while I waited for my dad to come home, I knit Mowgli a nice little sweater. I got too impatient and I didn’t make it long enough, but crop tops are in right now so… 🙂
Thanks for reading my blog! I hope you enjoyed it!!
<3,
Zoey and Mowgli
P.S. the message from my mom will have to remain a link to her blog until she gets home. Check it out though, she’s awesome and is having a great time!