My ‘Guilt Free’ Lasagna recipe

I’m not a red sauce kind of girl, but there is something about Lasagna that I’m a sucker for. Clearly, a classic lasagna isn’t part of a super clean diet, so I got creative and through trial and error came up with this very clean spin-off which we love and I frequently make on weekends. Hope you enjoy it as much as we have and feel free to make your own substitutions with the herbs/spices/meat sauce etc:

1. Peel and chop a whole yellow onion and about 7 – 8 cloves of garlic (I love garlic, but if you’re not a fan put less):

2.  Get a good quality, Cold Pressed Extra Virgin Olive Oil and sauté the Onion + Garlic with 1 – 2 tbs of Olive Oil:

3. Chop some Portabello Mushrooms while the above is cooking on low heat:

4. Once ingredients in the pot are golden and tender, add 2 packages (total around 1.5 lbs) of fresh Extra Lean Ground Turkey. You can easily substitute Turkey for Chicken if you prefer too. I’ve even done it with Veal once and it was amazing, but that was a treat. Continue to cook on medium heat until the meat has browned and cooked right through. You will notice water and fat extrapolating from the mixture. I usually take a colander at this point and drain all the fat to ensure it is extra – extra lean:

5. Add about 1.5 cans of sauce (whichever variety you prefer as long as it is clean and not jammed with hidden fats/sugars) + mushrooms + as many herbs and spices as you want. I always add freshly dried oregano, basil, thyme, parsley, salt and pepper. You can spice things up with chilis or cayenne pepper as this point too if preferred:

6. If you have the luxury of time, let this simmer for a while on a VERY low heat, stirring occasionally to really get the flavours out:

7. While that’s happening wash, dry, chop and steam the spinach. I used spinach from the garden, but it would be equivalent to about 1.5 of the bags you’d find in the grocery store (if you can find it, use baby spinach instead). In addition, drain any excess water from about 4 cups of non-fat cottage cheese. I hate watery cottage cheese and this lasagna gets sloppy if you don’t drain all the excess water out from the spinach and cottage cheese:

8. Take these two ingredients and mix them together with a dash of salt to create your cheese layer:

9. Slice zucchini length wise or cross wise to use as a substitute for the conventional lasagna noodles. These are from the garden again and much larger than what you’ll find in a grocery store. You will need about 6 smaller zucchini’s. Feel free to buy green and yellow ones for a splash of colour:

10. Now you have all the ingredients you’ll need. (Notice: I purchased a package of fresh noodles because it does add to the taste a bit and 1 layer isn’t going to kill you. I only use about 2 sheets from this whole package and freeze the rest for the next time):

11. First layer: Cover the base of your pan with some of the sauce you left over. This is so it doesn’t burn the bottom. Then, start with your first zucchini layer:

12. Next, up you’re going to continue layering. I start with a cheese layer first, then one sheet of pasta, followed by a meat layer, zucchini layer, cheese layer, zucchini layer and then finally topped off with a meat layer:

14. I cover it with foil for the first 45 minutes in the over set to 400 degrees, then cook it for the last 15 min with the foil removed to char the top meat layer a bit and VOILA, guilt free, protein packed lasagna!

Leave me a comment below to let me know how it turned out for you and any alterations you made to the recipe that I can try.

xxxo