Recipe: Skinny Zucchini Lasagna

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I made this recipe the FIRST week of sahm bliss and I have been meaning to share this recipe with you, but haven’t had the chance to yet. I always think of zucchini lasagna dishes as vegetarian dishes, but this one has ground beef in the homemade tomato sauce. I made an 9×12 pan of this dish and not a drop was wasted, it is so good and I think it is one of my favorite recipes I’ve made at home. You can find the original source for this recipe HERE, I did tweak a few things from the original recipe in this post.

homemade-sauce
Preheat the oven to 350. First, you will make the homemade tomato sauce, which is OH so good. I really would love to make this my tomato sauce for everything! First, brown the meat (I use ground chuck) then drain any fat. Add olive oil to the pan and add garlic (I used the jar kind) and onions until cooked through. Return the meat to the pan, add tomatoes, basil, salt and pepper. Cover and simmer on low for at least 30-40 minutes. The sauce DOES take some time to make, so if you want to save some time, you could make it the night before.

Cut-up-zucchini Next, you’ll want to use a potato peeler and peel off the skins of the zucchini. Then, use a mandolin to slice the zucchini into 1/8″ slices. My husband has a mandolin, but I didn’t know where it was… so, I just hand peeled them… they look a little sloppy (sorry!), but honestly you could not tell once I layered it with the meat sauce and cheese and it still tasted great! So, if you don’t have a mandolin, do not despair! You can still make this recipe. 🙂 You want to lightly salt the zucchini and let it sit for 10 minutes, it will sweat and you want to soak up the water with a paper towel. Zucchini retains a lot of moisture and you want to expel some of the moisture out of it so that your lasagna isn’t soggy!

Cook the zucchini 1-2 minutes per side on a pan on the stove.

Making-cheese-mixture
In a bowl mix the ricotta cheese parmesan cheese and egg.

Casserole-ready-for-oven
Then, we are finally at my FAVORITE part of making lasagna… the LAYERING! First, add some sauce on the bottom of the 9×12 pan and layer zucchini on top to cover. Then layer the ricotta cheese mixture the mozzarella cheese and REPEAT until everything is used up! Top the lasagna with the remaining sauce and mozzarella cheese and then cover with foil.

Bake for 45 minutes covered and then 15 minutes uncovered. Let it cool for 10 minutes before serving so it is easier to cut.

better-plate
Then, eat up! It is so, SO good! This recipe is such a keeper!

Does anyone know where you can find colored or fancier baking dishes at? I would love to have something prettier for baking up casseroles and lasagnas and my 9×12 clear glass Pyrex is so dull these days. Any ideas where I can find affordable yet fancy baking dishes?

Zucchini Lasagna (Skinnytaste.com)
Servings: 8 • Serving Size: 1/8 • Calories: 345

Ingredients

1 lb 93% lean beef (I used ground chuck)
3 cloves garlic (I used the kind that comes in the jar)
1/2 onion
1 tsp olive oil
salt and pepper
28 oz can crushed tomatoes
2 tbsp chopped fresh basil
3 medium zucchini, sliced 1/8″ thick (I peeled the skins off the zucchini before slicing)
15 oz part-skim ricotta
16 oz part-skin mozzarella cheese, shredded (Sargento)
1/4 cup Parmigiano Reggiano
1 large egg