EVERYTHING BUT THAT!

Love it  

Of course, I don’t think it is pos­si­ble for me to not like a lasagna, but the bonus with this recipe is that it is healthy.  I wish that the photo we just took showed the beau­ti­ful, green spinach a lit­tle more.

(This recipe was taken from Tosca Reno’s The Eat-Clean Diet Cook­book.)

Ingre­di­ents:

• 2.5 quarts water
• 4 Tbsp extra vir­gin olive oil
• 1 medium onion, peeled and chopped
• 3 cloves gar­lic, passed through a gar­lic press
• 3 ribs cel­ery, trimmed and chopped
• 2 car­rots, peeled and chopped
• 2 cups sliced mush­rooms — but­ton, shi­take, Por­to­bello, and/or other favorite
• 1.5 Tbsp low-sodium tamari
• freshly ground pepper
• 4 cups fresh spinach
• 1 lb dry lasagna noo­dles — look for nutrient-dense pas­tas made from tomato, spinach, kamut, spelt, etc.  (I used whole wheat)
• 2 cups tomato sauce (I cheat here and use 3 cups of Prego’s Ital­ian Sausage spaghetti sauce which is not “eat-clean” per se, but it is just so yummy, I like the extra pro­tein, and I fear dry lasagna.  Please be aware in the The Eat-Clean Diet Cook­book, there is a lovely, healthy recipe to make an eat-clean sauce for this lasagna).
• 2.5 cups non­fat cot­tage cheese
• 6 cups grated low– or non­fat moz­zarella cheese (I only used 4 cups, and the dish was still delicious)
• 1.5 cups goat cheese

Prepa­ra­tion:

1. Pre­heat oven to 375 degrees.  In a large skil­let heat olive oil over medium heat.  Add onion, gar­lic, cel­ery, and car­rot.  Cook 5 min­utes until veg­eta­bles become soft.  Add mush­rooms and saute for another few min­utes.  Stir in tamari, pep­per, and spinach.  Let spinach wilt.
2. In a large saucepan bring 2.5 qts of water to boil.  Pour a lit­tle olive oil into the water to pre­vent noo­dles from stick­ing.  Add lasagna noo­dles and cook al dente.  Drain noo­dles and run them under cool water.
3. Spread 1/2 cup or more of tomato sauce on the bot­tom of a lasagna pan that’s been coated with non­stick cook­ing spray.  Place a sin­gle layer of noo­dles on top.  Spread 3/4 cup  cot­tage cheese on top of lasagna noo­dles along with 1.5 cups mozzerella cheese, 1/2 cup goat cheese and one third of the spinach and veg­etable mix­ture.  Repeat the lay­ers until you run out of ingre­di­ents.  End with tomato sauce on top.
4. Bake in hot oven for 35 min­utes.  Sprin­kle more grated mozzerella cheese on top and return to oven for another 5 min­utes.  Remove from heat and let sit for 20 min­utes before cut­ting and serv­ing (Fat chance of that hap­pen­ing).  Do not skip this step (I’m part Sicil­ian; I’m not wait­ing).  It is much eas­ier to cut set lasagna (Well, this was def­i­nitely the case when I went back for seconds).