Lasagna a la Bucket

Sorry, it's been a long time since I posted a recipe!  I'll try to play catch-up this week.  Life's been a bit crazy, but we enjoyed a fantastic weekend as a family, renting out a cabin in the middle of nowhere!  Anyhow, here's tonight's dinner, Lasagna a la bucket!

Lasagna A La Bucket!

The Meat Sauce

In a large sauce pan, I added:

• 2 small onions, chopped (from the bucket)
• 1 clove of garlic, sliced (from the bucket)
• 1 pound of pork Italian sausage- I used the kind from Seeds and Spores
• splash of olive oil

I cooked these ingredients until the meat was fully cooked, then added:

• 3 bunches of fresh spinach, chopped
• 5 diced tomatoes (from the bucket)
• chopped fresh basil (from the bucket)
• 1 can of tomato paste
• a half cup of chicken broth
• a dash of Penzey's Black and Red and Italian Seasoning
• a splash of white wine

This meat/sauce mixture boiled on the stove until the tomatoes became soft and mushy.

 Fresh ingredients make better food!

 The sauce, as it began to simmer

The Cheese Mixture:
 
In a separate bowl I combined:

• 1 container of ricotta cheese
• 1 bag of shredded mozzarella cheese
• a generous sprinkle of grated Parmesan
• 2 eggs

 The cheese mixture

Putting the Lasagna together:

I boiled a large pot of water on the stove and began by cooking the whole wheat lasagna noodles 6 at a time for about 5 minutes.  I lined the bottom of the baking dish with a thin layer of marinara sauce.  I used Organicville brand, which is the best jarred marinara I have found! 

 Step One

When the first batch of noodles was ready, I layered 4 across the bottom of the pan, then covered the noodles with a layer of the cheese mixture, then a layer of the meat/tomato sauce mixture. 

Step 2

Step 3

Step 4

I repeated these steps until all of the noodles were used up and then topped the whole thing with the rest of the jar of marinara.  I wouldn't have necessarily needed to use the marinara sauce and could've just used more of my homemade meat sauce, I was just trying to use up the open jar that we had left from our weekend "camping" adventure and was trying to avoid my lasagna being too meaty.

I can't even speak for the results yet, as everything is assembled, but nothing is cooked or eaten yet!  I'll have to update the deliciousness later.  I do plan to stick it in a 350 degree oven for about 45 minutes-hour, covered with tin foil.