Meatless Lasagna

Dev and I are still going strong with our 'meatless' experiment! A couple weeks ago we tried Morningstar Farms Grillers Crumbles for Sloppy Joes and it was incredibly mushy and disappointing. This time we used Boca Ground Crumbles and I have to tell you, the texture held up very well. Another surprise find was Lightlife Gimme Lean! Sausage Style. Holy! This stuff tastes just like breakfast sausage. Dev loved it.

Preheat oven 425FMeatless Lasagna
1/2 package Lightlife Gimme Lean Sausage
2/3 package Boca Ground Crumbles
1 carrot
1 celery
1/2 onion
1 14oz can Mur Glen diced tomatoes (w/garlic & basil)
2 T tomato paste
1 C milk
1 C white wineFilling2 C cottage cheese
1 egg
1/4 C chopped parsley
1/2 C parmesan cheese
1 tsp salt
6 slices mozzarella cheese
Italian Cheese blend
Fresh Mozarella
Boca Crumbles and Gimme Lean.
Finely mince carrot, celery and onion.
Saute minced vegetables in olive oil until softned - about 5 min. Add tomato paste and saute until fragrant and nearly caramelized.
Add milk and simmer until evaporated. Add wine and simmer until evaporated.
In a separate pan, saute Ground Crumbles and Veg sasauge in olive oil until browned. Add to tomato mixture and stir in diced tomatoes.
I chose cottage cheese over ricotta because of a 'test kitchen' review I came across in Cooks Illustrated. Sometimes ricotta can have that gritty texture and it seems cottage cheese manages to retain a smooth texture. YEP. Puree cottage cheese and egg until almost smooth. In a small bowl combine cottage cheese mixture, parsley, parmesan cheese and salt. Layer sauce, noodles and top with cottage cheese mixture. Top with 6 slices moz cheese and shredded cheese.
Repeat layers.
Top with fresh mozzarella, shredded cheeseblend, cover with foil and bake for 30 min. Increase temp to 450F, remove foil and bake an additional 15 min. or until cheese is browned. Cool for 15 min.
I made some garlic toast using roasted garlic cloves, butter and fresh parsley. YUM!

Spaghetti Bolognese

Dev and I had this a few nights ago - I'm a little behind in my posts...

Whenever we have spaghetti, our go-to sauce is the store bought, bottled kind. But I keep coming across Spaghetti Bolognese recipes online that look amazing! The bolognese I've made for lasagna was delicious so I figured, why not give this a go! Usually, bolognese is made with beef and sometimes pork, and veal but I made this with ground turkey breast and a bit of Hot Italian sausage. It came out wonderful! I would definitely make this again (that is, when I have the time) ;-)

Spaghetti Bolognese
1 lb ground turkey breast
1/2 lb hot italian sausage
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 t salt 

black pepper

3 slices thick-cut applewood smoked bacon
1 small walla walal onion

1 carrot
2 stalks celery

1 C whole milk 

1 C dry white wine

3 C chicken broth (low salt)
1/3 cup + 1 T tomato paste

1 bay leaf
1 T sugar

1 lb spaghetti



Mix together the ground turkey, sausage, garlic and season with salt and pepper. Refrigerate for at least and hour.


Roughly chop onion, carrots and celery. I like to grind them in my mini-chopper until finely minced.



Roughly chop bacon. Over medium heat, saute the bacon and vegetable until they start to caramelize - about 20 min. Raise the heat and add meat mixture to pan. Cook until browned.
Add the milk and continue to cook until all the liquid has evaporated. Using a fork or potato masher, break up meat until fine.



Add tomato paste, wine, bay leaf and stock and bring to a boil. I like having these tiny wine bottles on hand in the pantry for cooking - then I won't waste a big bottle (I love red wine, but white wine isn't my thing)
Reduce heat to a low simmer and partially cover pot with lid. Simmer for until thickened - about 2 hours. If the sauce is still too liquid, raise the heat slightly, remove lid and keep simmering. Add sugar and season if necessary with salt and pepper.


Cook pasta to al dente in salted water and toss with the sauce.



Serve with freshly grated parmesan and garlic toast!

Lasagna Bolognese Part Deux!

Hey Kim, I'm keeping up with our health pact!

Tonight, I was pretty excited to try another stealth-health recipe redeux. This time, I let Dev IN on the experiment and he was onboard 100%! I could've taken an extreme route - whole wheat noodles, soy milk, veggie cheese... but come on, I don't think we're quite ready to go the distance... YET. Still... this is a good start...?

Alterations:
doubled the veggies
1lb ground beef ---> Veggie Ground Round
2 slices thick sliced bacon ---> turkey bacon + 1 thin slice bacon
4 cheese blend ---> part-skim mozzarella
whole milk for bolognese ---> 2% milk
whole milk for Béchamel ---> 2% + 1% milk

Preheat oven to 425F.

Lasagna Bolognese
Meat-ish Sauce
2 small carrots
2 celery ribs
1/2 onion
1 thin slice of bacon
2 slices turkey bacon, chopped
1 package Yves Veggie Ground Round, Original
2 Chicken spicy Italian sausage links (crumbled)
1 1/2C 2% milk
1 1/2C sake (I didn't have white wine)
2 spoonful tomato paste
1 can diced tomatoes (with basil and garlic)
salt to taste
ground black pepper
dash of paprika
dash of garlic salt

Fresh lasagna noodles
low moisture part-skim mozzarella

fresh mozzarella ball, sliced

a few shreds of parmesan


Roughly chop onions, carrots and celery.
Pulse in a mini-processor until finely chopped.


Saute bacon and turkey bacon together. Add celery, carrot and onion mixture and cook until softened on medium heat. Add Veggie Ground Round and Chicken Sausage. Cook, breaking up into small pieces.

Add milk, bring to a boil, lower heat and simmer and cook until liquid has evaporated - about 25 minutes.

I didn't have white wine on hand, so I used Sake as a substitute. Bring to a boil, lower heat and simmer until liquid has evaporated - about 25 minutes.


Puree diced tomatoes. Add tomato paste and tomato puree to pan - bring to a boil, lower heat and simmer for 15 minutes until thickened. Add salt to taste, a dash of paprika and garlic salt. Take off heat and cool.

Béchamel
3T unsalted butter (instead of 4T)
1/4C all-purpose flour
2C 1% milk + 2C 2% milk (instead of 4C whole milk)
salt

Melt butter over medium heat; add flour and cook, whisking constantly for about 2 mintues. Don't brown. Gradually add milk, bring to a boil, whisking frequently. Add salt, lower heat and simmer for 10 min.

The low-fat milk didn't thicken as well as the whole milk (obviously), so I made an additional roux of a spoonful of cornstarch + water. This helped thicken it up to the right consistency. Let cool.

Add 3/4 C of béchamel to the meat-ish sauce. Combine well.

We found these fresh noodles at Whole foods - never tried them before and wanted to give it a try. Boil noodles for 1 minute. Cool in ice bath and drain.

Spray pan with cooking spray. Place meat sauce into bottom of pan. Layer noodles, meat sauce & béchamel.


Top with a little shaved parmesan and shredded mozzarella. Repeat layering 3 more times.

Cover the top completely with the remaining béchamel sauce, a little more shredded mozzarella and a few thin slices of fresh mozzarella cheese. (Dev loves his cheese).
Cover with foil (coated with cooking spray) and bake for 30 minutes. Remove foil, increase heat to 450F, and bake an additional 15 minutes until bubbly and browned on top. Cool for at least 15 minutes - it will be easier to cut.

Dinner is served! Dev said he'd eat this again!