Lasagna

Serves: 12 or so in Time: About 4 hours

1 lb. sweet Italian sausage

1 lb. lean ground beef

1/2 C. minced onion

2 cloves garlic, crushed

1 can (28 oz.) crushed tomatoes

2 cans (6 oz. each) tomato paste

1 can (15 oz.) tomato sauce

1/2 C. water

2 Tbsp. white sugar

1 1/2 tsp. dried basil leaves

1/2 tsp. fennel seed

1 tsp. Italian seasoning

1 Tbsp. salt

1/4 tsp. ground black pepper

4 Tbsp. chopped parsley, divided

12 lasagna noodles

15 oz. ricotta cheese

1 egg

1/2 tsp. salt

1 lb. mozzarella cheese, sliced

3/4 C. pamersan cheese, shredded

-In a large pan, brown meat, onion and garlic. Stir in tomatoes, water, sugar, basil, fennel, Italian seasoning, 1 Tbsp. salt, pepper, and 2 Tbsp. parsley. Cover and simmer for 1 1/2 hours, stirring occasionally.

-Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Cook lasagna noodles as directed on package. Drain and rinse noodles with cold water and set aside.

-Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In a mixing bowl, combine ricotta, egg, remaining parsley, and 1/2 tsp. salt.

-In a 9x13-inch baking dish, spread 1 1/2 C. meat sauce over bottom of pan. Arrange 6 noodles over sauce and spread with half of the ricotta mixture. Top with 1/3 of mozzarella slices. Spoon 1 1/2 C. meat sauce over cheese and sprinkle with 1/4 C. parmesan. Repeat layers, ending with remaining cheese. Spray foil with cooking spray and secure over baking dish.

-Bake for 25 minutes. Remove foil and bake another 25 minutes. Cool for 15 minutes before serving.

Notes: I get the crushed tomatoes with Italian seasoning, as well as the garlic and basil tomato sauce. Usually the meat portions are more generous in one package than listed, but I have adjusted the tomatoes to compensate. Also, the usual package of lasagna noodles has about 16, and I cook them all to make sure I have whole noodles to work with in case of breaking/sticking. I also recently tried this as shown above, by splitting the recipe into 2 8X8 pans and they came out okay-- both were still pretty full. The ricotta portion is fairly thin for each layer, and you may want to double it if you love the ricotta cheese.