Zucchini Lasagna

Over the last few years, I have seen a few zucchini lasagnas. Some made in a large 9x13 baking dish and some in loaf pans. We had two of our three older granddaughters over, along with my Mom and I wanted to make something hearty, that would be more like a casserole with the entire dinner in one dish. This was a perfect opportunity to try a Zucchini Lasagna.

This can be a laborious task because you’ll need a recipe of your favorite Bolognese sauce (a meat & tomato sauce), you’ll need to get our your ingredients ready to go and you’ll need to slice and prep the zucchini. However, once everything is out, you just assemble and bake. Protein and vegetables all in one and you are done!

To prepare the zucchini, you’ll need to slice and do something to draw out the water in the zucchini-zucchini containers lots of water, so you have two options. One, you can salt your zucchini slices, in a larger colander and let sit for about 15 minutes, than rinse (I do the same when preparing eggplant to cook as it contains lots of water too). Two, you could grill your zucchini to eliminate the water. Do which ever method fits into your time frame and availability-you may not have a grill handy.

Here you you!

This time I used a smaller rectangular baking dish, an 8x8 or similar size dish works as well.

Ingredients

-2 large zucchini

-1-14 ounce can tomato sauce (or bottle) see image below

Either a 14 ounce can of tomato sauce or use about 1/2 a bottle of this, Passata-tomato puree- for the first layer in the baking dish.

-Bolognese Sauce made with 1 pound of ground beef

-2 Tablespoons olive oil

-1-28 ounce can of crushed tomatoes

-1 chopped onion

-3 cloves garlic

-2 stalks chopped celery

-1/2 cup red wine

-Salt & pepper to taste

-a hand full of mini/grape tomatoes

-1 container of Ricotta cheese

-1 8 ounce bag of shredded Mozzarella cheese

-1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese (a little extra for top layer)

-1 egg

-1 handful of freshly chopped basil and parsley

Method

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Wash and slice your zucchini, salt and let set in a colander for about 15 minutes.
While zucchini sets, make your Bolognese.

-heat olive oil

-add ground beef and brown

-add celery, cook until soft

-add garlic, cook for 1 minute

-add 1/2 cup red wine, cook for 2-3 minutes

-add canned tomatoes and tomato paste

-add salt and pepper

-add mini tomatoes

-cook about 10 additional minutes

3. Mix in a bowl, Ricotta, egg, Parmesan cheese, basil and parsley. Set aside.

4. Rinse salt off your zucchini

5. Now start to assemble. Pour some of your tomato sauce in bottom of your baking dish (I like a square 8x8 or similar size).