July 28, 2011

Low - Carb Vegetable Lasagna

This recipe is the low-carb version of lasagna because I used baked eggplant as my noodles. Actually it was so good that both my 8 and 6 year olds had no problems eating all of their vegetables!
 
 

  

Ingredients:
    Noodles
    2 large eggplants, peeled, sliced lengthwise into 1/4 inch noodle-like strips
    cooking spray (olive oil spray is best)
    salt and pepper

 

Meat Sauce
2 lbs of ground turkey, chicken or turkey sausage
2 T olive oil
2 onions, chopped
3 garlic cloves chopped
1 red pepper, chopped
1 (16 ounce) package sliced mushrooms
2 tablespoons Italian seasoning (or mix of oregano, basil and thyme)
salt and pepper
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 (10 ounce) package frozen spinach
1 (28 ounce) can tomato puree
1 (15 ounce) can diced tomatoes

Cheese Mixture:
2 eggs
2 c. part-skim ricotta cheese
6 scallions chopped
3 c. mozzarella cheese
1/2 c.Parmesan cheese

Method:
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Spray cookie sheet, arrange eggplant slices and season with salt and pepper and cook slices 5 minutes on each side. Reduce oven heat to 375 degrees.

Brown meat, onion and garlic in olive oil for 5 minutes. Then add red pepper and mushrooms, and cook 5 more minutes. Add spinach, tomatoes, spices and simmer for 5-10 minutes.

In the meantime blend ricotta, egg and onion mixture.

Assembly:
Spread 1/3 of meat sauce in bottom of 9? x 13? glass pan.
Layer ½ eggplant slices, ½ ricotta, 1/3 mozzarella and parmesan.
Repeat.
Add last layer of sauce, then mozzarella and parmesan on top.
Cover with foil and bake at 375 degrees for 1 hour.
Remove foil and bake or broil another 5-10 minutes until cheese is browned.

 Let it rest 10 minutes before slicing, if you can wait that long!

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