Zucchini Lasagna
August 8th, 2011 | Posted by in Vegetable Lovin'Got a lot of zucchini right now?
Did you know you can use zucchini in place of pasta in lasagna?
It’s true. I proved it tonight.
To start, you’ll need two large zucchinis – slice length wise into 1/4 inch strips. (Think thin!) Place into a colander and salt each slice to start removing some of their water.
Preheat oven to 350 and set your zucchini aside for about 20 minutes to sweat it out over the sink.
Meanwhile, get to work on your sauce and cheese layers.
If you are an experienced lasaganian (new word, noun – a person who makes lasagna), make your sauce and cheese layers per usual.
If you are new to the world of lasagna, I’ve got more complete instructions here.
Sauce:
saute onion, garlic and a couple handfuls of spinach in olive oil. Once soft, add 28 oz can stewed tomatoes, 6 oz can of tomato paste, 1 tsp of sugar, dash of salt, shredded carrots, basil and oregano. Cook on medium low until it starts to simmer and reduce heat to low until you’re ready to start assembling your lasagna, occasionally stirring.
Cheese:
1 egg beaten, stir in 15 oz ricotta cheese, 8 oz shredded mozzarella, 1/4 c Parmesan cheese.
Once your zucchini looks like it just finished a Bikram yoga class, rinse and then blot with a paper towel to dry.
I’d never made zucchini lasagna (I’ve never been to Bikram yoga either), so I studied a bunch of recipes before I got started.
Based on what I read, I was a bit paranoid about there being too much moisture here with all that zucchini – so after salting it, I popped those zucchini noodles into the preheated oven for about 15 minutes.
Once it starts to brown and each slice is dried out a bit more – it’s time to rock.
I mean, it’s time to start layering.
Your lasagna layers should be assembled as follows:
start with a thin layer of sauce
zucchini layer
cheese
sauce
more zucchini
more cheese
more sauce
zucchini one last time
sauce to top it off
sprinkle of parm
I re-sliced some of the thicker slices during assembly (again, soggy lasagna paranoia taking hold here).
Piecing the zucchini layers together got interesting toward the end.
Bake at 350 for 40 – 50 minutes. Optionally top with about 4 oz of shredded mozzarella for the last 10 minutes.
Let your zucchini casserole sit for about 10 minutes before cutting into,
then go ahead dive right in.
I was definitely pleased with the way this turned out – some water remained in the pan upon serving, but no lasagna remained on the plates upon chow time.
Two zucchini down, nine to go.
Linked to Fight Back Friday at Food Renegade
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Interesting. I would never have thought of trying that. It looks just like regular lasagna but SO much better for you than using pasta. You mentioned salting the zucchini which got me thinking. That’s a lot like eggplant. Is that something you did just because of the way you were going to be cooking with it or do you always sweat out the moisture? I’m asking because we tried grilling zucchini and it didn’t turn out well at all. It was soggy, flimsy and just yuk. Maybe I should have salted and let it sit out first.
I don’t think I’ve ever salted zucchini before tonight, but I definitely thought about the fact that you do the same thing with eggplant before making eggplant parm… usually when I cook with zucchini I shred it and just account for the moisture by including less liquid. I think salting it before grilling or roasting it could help with the sogginess factor for sure.
Looks and sounds great! Never tried this, but I can totally see why it would work. I like zucchini to start with and they are pretty “mild.” I also think tomato sauce and gooey cheese make pretty much anything good!
Amen!
What a great idea! I just don’t have any tomato sauce on hand. lol
remember recently when you said something to the effect that “if you don’t have fresh zucchini in summertime you don’t have any friends”…(paraphrasing)
I’m one of those people.
I would totally make sweaty (or not) zuk lasagna but me has no huge zuk’s.
the ones at the store are puney.
your lasagna looks AMAZING.
if you lived closer than 3,000 miles away there’d be zucchini on your back door step from me!
If I lived closer than 3000 miles away we’d be hanging out.
we’d be talking food and running and letting da kidlets play.
and yes, I’d be in veggie heaven!
damn those 3000 miles!
xoxoxo
