This will be the best lasagna you’ve ever made. Pretty much impossible to screw up.
This makes a full 13×9″ pan of lasagna, which is about a dozen hearty servings. If you’re not cooking for an army, you can easily cut every ingredient in half and use an 8×8″ pan instead.
Ingredients/shopping list:
- 1 lb ground beef
- 1 lb hot italian sausage
- 2 14.5 oz cans of diced tomatoes
- 2 6 oz cans of tomato paste
- 1/2 yellow onion
- 3 cups of ricotta
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 cup of parmesan cheese
- About 1/2 lb spinach, fresh or frozen
- 1 lb mozzarella, shredded
- 1 lb lasagna noodles
- 2 garlic cloves
- Lots of parsley
- Lots of basil
- Salt
- Red wine, preferably Cabernet Sauvignon
Preheat the oven to 350 F. Get out your full-size glass 13×9″ baking pan and grease it up with some Pam or butter on a paper towel, or whatever you like to do.
There are three tasks that must be completed before you can build the lasagna. They can be done in parallel. This is a recipe where too many cooks will probably not spoil the broth, it goes much quicker if you have helpers who can follow instructions.
1. Make the meat sauce.
Dice up the 1/2 yellow onion and mince 2 cloves of garlic. Sautée this all together in a pan with some vegetable oil.
In a second pan, starting with a bit of vegetable oil, cook the beef and sausage together on medium-high heat for about 7-10 minutes, stirring frequently and breaking up the meat into smaller pieces. Remove from heat when it seems like it’s almost done.
Pour the onion/garlic mixture and the meat into a large bowl for mixing. Add the cans of tomatoes and tomato paste, 1/2 cup of the wine, 2 tbsp parsley, 2 tbsp basil, 1 tsp salt. Stir it all up into a delicious sauce.
2. Make the cheese sauce.
Combine in a bowl:
- 3 cups ricotta
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 cup parmesan, cheap stuff is fine
- 2 tbsp parsley
- 1 tsp salt
- Spinach to taste. Roughly 1/2 lb, either thawed cooked spinach or fresh spinach leaves.
Mix it all up very thoroughly until it has an even consistency like mashed potatoes.
3. Cook the lasagna noodles. Boil them for 6-7 minutes, drain, and lay them all out on sheets of foil. The noodles should be pliable but only half-cooked.
FINALLY, it is time to build the lasagna.
Look at your noodles and mentally divide them into thirds. Take the first third and lay them down in the pan so they cover the whole bottom of the pan.
Spread 1/3 of the cheese sauce onto the noodles.
Spread 1/3 of the meat sauce onto the cheese sauce.
Spread 1/3 of the 1-lb bag of mozzarella cheese onto the meat sauce.
Repeat. Noodles, cheese sauce, meat sauce, cheese. 3 layers total.
Bake it for 30 minutes at 350 F. Let it cool down before you try to eat it, you animal.