A couple months ago my best bud Nat and I had made a veggie lasagna that tasted heavenly so I wanted to recreate it for tim and his family (one with eggs/dairy and a vegan one). It was challenging balancing two different lasagnas (baking times and ingredients) but everyone took seconds so I think it was a success. Both the Veggie and the Vegan one were inspired by recipes on Allrecipes.com but I’ve put my adapted recipe here…

Spinach Vegan Lasagna

( I used cooked lasagna noodles and a 9X9 pan which feeds about 4 hungry people)

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 medium onion chopped
• 1/2 red bell pepper chopped
• 2-3 cloves garlic minced
• handful of cauliflower chopped (small bits)
• 2 (14.5 ounce) cans/jars of your fave pasta sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 8-12 lasagna noodles (depending how deep your dish)
• 1 pound firm tofu
• 1 clove minced garlic
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil
• 2 tablespoons chopped parsley
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• ground black pepper to taste
• 1 (10 ounce) package frozen chopped spinach, thawed and drained well
• 1 package shredded veggie mozzarella
• 1/2 tsp lemon juice

Directions

1. Make the sauce: In a medium, heavy saucepan, over medium heat, heat the olive oil. Place the onions in and saute them until they are soft, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic, red bell peppers, and cauliflower in the saucepan; cook 5 minutes more.
2. Add the pasta sauce. Stir well, turn the heat to low and let the sauce simmer covered for 10 minutes. Add the salt and pepper.
3. While the sauce is cooking bring a large kettle of salted water to a boil. Boil the lasagna noodles for 7-9 minutes, then drain and rinse well.
4. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C).
5. Place the tofu blocks in a medium bowl. Add the garlic, basil and parsley. Add the lemon juice, salt and pepper, and mash all the ingredients together by squeezing pieces of tofu through your fingers. Mix well.
6. Assemble the lasagna: Spread a  layer of tomato sauce mix in the bottom of a 9×19 inch casserole pan. Arrange a single layer of lasagna noodles, sprinkle the tofu mixture over the noodles. Distribute the spinach evenly over the tofu. Next ladle the tomato sauce over the tofu (enough to cover it – not too much or else it will become soupy), and top it with another layer of the noodles. Repeat this so long as your dish is deep enough. Finally, top the noodles with the remaining tomato sauce and sprinkle the entire bag of veggie mozzarella or until it’s completely covered.
   
7. Cover the pan with foil and bake the lasagna for 30 minutes. Serve hot and enjoy. You can also add a leaf of basil on top like in the picture above.

I’ll post the other recipe next time…