For Father's Day my husband requested his favorite meal for dinner, my lasagna. :) I figured since I was taking the (long) time to make it, I'd snap a few pictures and share the recipe with all of you!
First you chop, chop, slice! CHOP! I start with carrots, onions and mushrooms, YUM!
Melt some butter in a deep skillet and throw in all the veggies. Stir them around, let them love each other.. smell the aroma! Mmmm....
When your veggies start to brown, throw in 1 pound of LEAN ground beef and 1 pound of mild flavor sausage. I seasoned with a little Mrs Dash Garlic & Herb and a bit of fresh ground pepper. Add in one medium chopped zucchini for the last 3-4 minutes of browning.
Then you throw in all this deliciousness. Obviously you can choose any sauce you'd like. Today, Terry chose Parmesan and Romano. We heart cheese around here! I also add a can of diced tomatoes that are flavored. Again, choose your flavor. The spaghetti seasoning packet is to thicken the sauce from the extra juice from the tomatoes. Plus, adds more yummy flavorrrrr!
After you add the sauce and tomatoes, turn it down to low and cover. This will help those veggies get extra tender and delicious. In the mean time, let's make more CHEESE!Thaw [according to package directions] on 10 oz package of frozen spinach. To the spinach add 1 pound of Ricotta cheese, 1 egg, and 1/2 cup parmesan cheese.
**Have I mentioned yet that we LOVE cheese?**
And back to the SAUCE! As if we didn't have enough cheese already, let's go ahead an add a block of cream cheese to our sauce, like so....
And stir until it looks like this:
Time to LAYER! Start with PAM! There will be NO sticking in this house. Then cover the bottom with sauce, a layer of cooked lasagna noodles, then schmear on the spinach ricotta.
Repeat! Sauce, noodle, ricotta. And PLEASE my friends, DRY THOSE NOODLES! Your sauce's worst enemy is WATER. Don't do it! When you get to the top layer, treat your self to even more cheese.. this time, shredded.
Put it in the oven that you've preheated to 375* F and set the timer for 30 minutes. Because you have absolutely nothing better to do, take your kid outside to ride his new bike that he got for his birthday.
Once he's nice and sweaty, you know it's time to heat. Take the lasagna from the oven and let it stand for 10 minutes. Or you will have lasagna soup. While the lasagna is resting after so much hard work, toast up some garlic bread. YUM!When it's done, you should see something ever-so-spectacular. This:
You serve your husband, it is Fathers Day after all. He loves it. :)
**Note how we broke out our finest China? Hey, I cooked, I don't want to clean, too!*Bubba... not so much love. He's never like "beezonya". I swear he's not our real kid.
