What I'm Eating This Week: Spinach Lasagna!!!!

Yup!  I'm eating lasagna.  And losing weight while doing it.  Well...mostly.  It goes up and down like weight does, especially on weekends.  It's so hard to keep my eating under control on the weekends.  Does anyone else have that problem?  How do you remedy it?

So I normally avoid pasta like the plague because I turn into a zombie around it.  I'm serious, I lose all self-control and it just becomes a "braaaaiiiiiinnnnnssss" situation.  I will go back for seconds, thirds, and even fourths.  But, I love lasagna because the pasta is incorporated into the entire dish!  It's not a standalone thing where I get to pick and choose how much of it I get to have.  There's only a set amount in every piece.  It's brilliant because it's automatically portion controlled pasta!  I'm safe from becoming a pasta fiend.  Let's just say that options are not my friend in MANY areas of my life.

As for my running: I'm on week 3!  I ran a whole 3 minutes without stopping ;)  I know, I'm a rockstar.  Though my knees did start to hurt after the run today which makes me so nervous.  Time to bust out the ice packs again.

Anyway, here is what I'm eating this week:

You can find the original recipe at Pinch of Yum.

Ingredients:

• 2 Tablespoons Butter
• 1 Tablespoon Minced Garlic (or like 7 cloves)
• 1 Teaspoon Thyme
• 5 Ounces Baby Spinach
• 2 Pounds Ricotta
• 1 Egg
• 1/2 Teaspoon Salt
• Splash Apple Cider Vinegar, to taste
• 12 Oven Ready Lasagna Noodles
• 25 Ounce Jar Pasta Sauce (I used a mushroom one)
• 2 Cups Shredded Mozzarella
• 1 Cup Water

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. Melt the butter over medium heat in a large saucepan.
3. Add garlic and thyme and saute for about 2 minutes.
4. Add spinach and saute until barely wilted and remove from heat.
5. In a large bowl, combine ricotta, egg, salt and vinegar.
• If you would like, add a portion of this mixture to food processor and mix.  This step is entirely optional and the recipe will turn out fantastic even if you don't do this.
6. Add a small amount of pasta sauce to a 9x13 pan, just enough to cover the bottom and place 3 lasagna noodles over the sauce.
7. Top with 1/3 of the ricotta mixture, 1/4 sauce and 1/2 cup of mozzarella.
8. Repeat once more.
9. Pour 1/2 cup of water over the layers.
10. Repeat the layers one more time.
11. The final layer will be 3 lasagna noodles, remaining 1/4 sauce and 1/2 cup mozzarella.
12. Pour another 1/2 cup water over the lasagna and cover with greased foil.
13. Place in oven for 30-40 minutes
14. Remove foil and bake for another 10-20 minutes until water is mostly evaporated.
15. Let lasagna sit for at least 10 minutes before serving so that the noodles can absorb any remaining water.
16. Enjoy!

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Nutrition:

• The original recipe was for 12 servings, but I like my servings a little larger than that so I made this into an 8 serving recipe.
• By my calculations, with the ingredients I used, this is about 450 calories per serving.

Notes:

• I would probably add less water next time as I don't think my oven gets hot enough to really cook it all out fast enough.  So keep that in mind when making yours.  If your oven gets hot, you'll need more water, if not, you'll want to use less.
• I try to stagger the lasagna noodles as they aren't quite long enough to cover the entire pan.
• This is actually my second time making this recipe but I've changed a few things up this time: I used the food processor this time around.

BTW, Pinch of Yum is my favorite recipe website.  That girl is absolutely a genius when it comes to cooking for real life.  Go check out her site if you are looking for recipe inspirations.












Safe Travels and Scrumptious Eats,