Zucchini Lasagna

I was inspired to come up with a zucchini lasagna recipe after my friend Christie told me about a recipe she saw on Pinterest. I wanted to make it simple, and have it dairy free so Superman and Josh could both enjoy it, too. Of course, you could throw some of your favorite cheese into this recipe, and it would be delicious! P.S. You could make your own spaghetti sauce if you prefer, but I was trying to make this as simple as possible, so went with a prepared one. Eden Organic makes an excellent pizza/pasta sauce that contains no sugar. Note: if you are sensitive to tomatoes, see below the recipe for an alternative to tomato sauce!

Recipe: Zucchini Lasagna

1 *huge* zucchini or 4-5 regular zucchinis (I used 1 zucchini that was about 18″ long)

3 lbs ground beef

32 oz jar of your favorite spaghetti sauce (I used (2) 15-oz jars of Eden Organic)

1 onion, diced

(1) 16 oz bag frozen chopped spinach, semi thawed

1 cup walnuts

2 cloves garlic

3 TBSP olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Slice ends off of zucchini and if it’s a large one, cut in half. Slice in 1/8″ pieces (or use a mandolin–I didn’t have one, so I just sliced it thin) and place into a colander, sprinkling lightly with salt as you layer each piece to help the water drain out:

Let sit while you prepare the rest of the lasagna. Heat oil in a large skillet and cook onion until starting to brown. Add meat and cook until starting to brown, then add spaghetti sauce and remove from heat. In a food processor, process the walnuts, garlic and spinach until semi-smooth.

Move the zucchini around a bit in the colander and shake to make sure the water has drained off it, and pat dry. Put a little of the sauce mixture on the bottom of a 9×13 pan, then place one layer of the zucchini on top. Add some of the spinach mixture, then more sauce. Here’s what it looked like after one layer:

Repeat until everything is used up, ending with some zucchini and sauce on top. Place filled 9×13 pan onto a baking sheet (it may bubble over), and cover tightly with foil. Bake for 40 minutes, remove foil and bake for another 10 minutes. Let sit for 10 minutes before eating.

*For those of you who can’t tolerate tomatoes, here is an alternative sauce recipe. I haven’t personally tried it yet, but come back and let me know if you do and how you like it! The No-Tomato Sauce

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