This recipe is a variation of one from Good Housekeeping's 100 Best Italian Recipes. You can make the sauce meatless if you prefer. I used fresh lasagna noodles from a local Italian grocery store and I would recommend you do the same. They are made from 100% durum semolina flour. This flour is an excellent source of protein. Two sheets of this pasta have 14 grams of protein. To calculate your own protein needs, you should multiply your body weight in kilos by .8 to get the number of grams of protein you should be eating per day. For instance, a person who weighs 50 kilos should get about 40 grams of protein per day. You do not have to boil this lasagna and it melts in your mouth! The noodles expand in the pan while cooking, so leave some space at the side of the pan when placing the noodles. The sheets of lasagna I used were about 6 inches wide, uncooked. Once cooked they expanded to about 9 inches wide. I also used jalapeno & red chili peppers to spice it up and that is optional, depending on your taste for heat. Also, I am not a big fan of mozarella cheese (unless it is fresh buffalo mozarella, but you wouldn't hide that in a lasagna), so I doubled the amount of parmesan and didn't use mozarella. You can make this dish a day ahead & refrigerate before cooking it. In this case you should add about 15 minutes to the cooking time.Ingredients:
Meat Sauce:
2 tbsps olive oil
1 lb lean ground beef (or veal or chicken or turkey)
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 cans (28 oz each) diced tomatoes & their juice
4 tbsps tomatoe paste
1/2 tsp salt (or less)
1/2 tsp coarsely ground black pepper
2 tbsps chopped fresh basil leaves (or 1 tbsp dried)
2 tsps dried red chili peppers
1 jalapeno pepper, chopped
Cheese filling:
1 large egg
1/4 tsp coarsely ground black pepper
1 container (16 oz) light ricotta cheese (5% milk fat)
4 oz part-skim mozarella cheese, shredded (1 cup)--if using
3/4 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese (double this if not using the mozarella)
1 package fresh, no boil, lasagna noodles (6 noodles about 6 inches in width)
1. Prepare sauce: Heat large heavy bottomed saucepan over medium high heat. Add olive oil and ground meat (if using) and cooking, stirring & breaking up with a fork, about 2 minutes. Add onion and cook, stirring occasionally & continuing to break up meat, until meat is browned and onion is tender. Add garlic & jalapeno and cook about 1 minute.
2. Stir in tomatoes with their juice, tomato paste, red chili peppers and salt & ground pepper; heat to boiling. Reduce heat to low and cook uncovered, stirring occasionally, about 20 minutes. Stir in basil.
3. Meanwhile, prepare filling. In medium bowl, mix egg, pepper, ricotta, 1/2 cup of the mozarella, and 1/2 cup of the parmesan until blended.
4. Preheat oven to 375F. In 13 x 9 inch glass baking dish, evenly spread 2 cups of sauce. Arrange one noodle over sauce ( noodles will expand while cooking). Top with 1 cup cheese filling, spreading across noodle. Place another lasagna noodle over the cheese and top that with 2 more cups of sauce. Continue to layer in this way until you have used 6 of the lasagna noodles. Top with 2 cups of sauce. Sprinkle with remaining 1/2 cup mozarella and 1/4 cup parmesan. (If making a day ahead, cover and refrigerate at this point).
5. Cover lasagna with foil and bake until heated through and bubbling, about 1 hour (15 minutes longer if it was refrigerated). Remove foil and cook another 10 minutes. Let stand 10 minutes before cutting, for easier serving.
