A Recipe Made In Heaven

I love lasagna. I love my crockpot. Therefore, I love lasagna made IN my crockpot.

I got this recipe from A Year of Crockpotting and I’m amazed at how good it tastes and how easy it is to make. Whoever figured out that lasagna noodles will cook to perfection in a crockpot was a genius!

I did all the prep work and assembly on Sunday night, and then Jeremy popped it into the crockpot on Monday morning. He turned it on, and we had homemade lasagna that was easy, schmeezy in just a few hours.

You ready for this?

The Ingredients:
1 box of regular lasagna noodles
1 large jar of pasta sauce
1 container of ricotta cheese
1 or 2 packages of shredded Italian cheese
Any fresh veggies you like (I used baby spinach leaves)
1 lb of hamburger meat (optional)
Spices you use normally when you brown ground meat (I used Garlic Salt)
1/4 cup water

The Directions:
Brown the meat with spices in large skillet. Drain. Pour in the entire jar of pasta sauce, but save the jar, don't rinse or throw away. Simmer on low for a few minutes. Put a ladle full of sauce mixture into the bottom of your crockpot. Top with a layer of dry lasagna noodles. You'll have to break them to fit. Smear ricotta cheese on top of lasagna noodles and then layer veggies (I used baby spinach leaves) on top of the ricotta cheese. Add a handful of the shredded cheese and then ladle on some more of the meat sauce. Top with more dry noodles and repeat layers until crockpot is to desired capacity. I ended up with 3 layers. Put the 1/4 cup of water into your empty pasta jar and shake. Pour tomatoey juice over the whole pile of food.

Cover and cook on low for 8 hours or high for 4. Check the noodles an hour before serving, and push the top ones down into the liquid if they are getting too hard or are curling up.

*If you are prepping at night to cook the next day, stick the pasta jar into the fridge with the assembled lasagna and add the tomatoey sauce the next morning.

I think the only thing that I would change is that I think I cooked ours just a little bit too long, but it was really good, especially for how easy it was to put together. The cheese is all gooey and golden brown, and it is delicious! I hope you enjoy!