Low Fat Lasagna

[cat lover]

The origianl recipe came from about.com, but I changed some of the low fat items into Fat free items


2 tsp olive oil
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 1/2 cups mushrooms, sliced
1 celery stalk, chopped
1 medium carrot, diced
1 medium zucchini, chopped
1 yellow squash, chopped
1 28-ounce can crushed tomatoes
2 tbsp tomato paste
1 tsp oregano
black pepper
2 handfuls spinach salad leaves, chopped into medium pieces
1 15-ounce tub fat-free ricotta OR fat free cottage cheese
8-ounces no-cook lasagna noodles
3/4 cup fat free shredded mozzarella cheese

Preheat oven to 375 degrees, and coat an 11 X 7-inch baking dish with nonstick cooking spray. Heat oil in a large saucepan. Sauté garlic for 1 minute, followed by onion, mushrooms, celery, carrots, zucchini and squash. Sauté for 10 minutes or till vegetables are softened. Add tomatoes, tomato paste, herbs and some black pepper. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer for 10 minutes. Stir in spinach. Spread a cup of sauce on the bottom of the baking dish. Top with noodles, followed by half the ricotta cheese; add another layer of sauce, followed by noodles and remaining ricotta cheese. Continue with remaining noodles and sauce, ending with sauce. Top with mozzarella and bake for 30 minutes. Serves 8.

[Jo-Anne]

cat_lover!!!
Emergency question....do you think I can do all this in a crockpot? I am hosting family birthdays on Sunday...my sister is vegetarian and the crockpot recipes I find have like 20 expensive ingredients (I may as well buy the lasagna). This recipe seems quite reasonable.
What do you think?
Jo-Anne

[cat lover]

Okay, the above recipe I have never cooked in a crockpot but have others, so if you just substitute the above ingredients here are the general instructions for cooking lasagna in the crockpot I have used.

The lasagana noodles are broken into bite size pieces and then you just combine all the ingredients in a greased crockpot, cover and cook on LOW 7-9 hours or HIGH 3-5 hours.

The other way I have done it is : break the noodles and place half in the bottom of a greased crocokpot. Brown the meat( or in this case cook the veggies as described above and use them as the meat) drain and stir in seasonings, spread half over noodles in crockpot. Layer half of sauce and other ingredients over meat/veggies and repeat layers. Cover and cook on LOW 5 hours. So I would think if you followed one of these using the ingredients above it should work. I would try a pot of it though before ytou havecompany to see if you like the way it cooks ibn the crockpot. I personally like the first method for the crockpot where you just mix the ingredients because you have to serve it out with a large spoon anyway; you can't slice and serve it out of the crockpot like in a 9 x 13 pan. Let me know how it works for you.

[Yummys_Girl]

This looks good. Let us know how it turns out in the crock, Jo-Anne!