Lasagna I

A frenzy of holiday "no sew" fleece blanket making (see background)  resulted in little attention paid to the documentation of the Vegetarian Slow Cooking lifestyle.  Rest assured, while the blankets were not being sewed, the crocks were still cooking.  The writing was put on hold and these entries will be back-dated until things are all caught up.  I promised a crock lasagna to a reader in a recent comment.  This was the first experiment.  Ease of preparation was a primary requirement.  No cook lasagna noodles a must.  This was made during the holiday stay at Cousin Cake Queen's house.  It took 12 minutes from start to finish.  The onions and garlic were sauteed in olive oil, but if one is more hurried the taste should not suffer too much by omitting the step. It was assembled during Cousin Cake Queen's lunch hour and ready at the end of the work day.  Once could assemble this the night before, and place it in the crock cooking base plugged into a lamp timer in the morning for a delayed afternoon start and a poerfect end of workday finish.

Winner, Loser, or Meh

This was absolutely delicious.  When first served, it was so melty cheesy wonderful Cousin Cake Queen and I both squealed.  We could hardly wait for the next day when we knew it would taste even better. (All soups and casseroles taste better the second day.)  The picture was taken after it had a few hours to cool off and firm up.

Recipe

I used a 5 1/2-6 quart oval crock for this.

Ingredients:

• 1 large yellow onion, peeled, diced fine
• 2 Tbls olive oil
• 3 large cloves garlic, minced
• 12 oz package frozen Morningstar Grillers Crumbles (frozen vegetarian meat substitute)
• 1lb 10 oz jar marinara sauce (I used Ragu)
• water to rinse marinara jar (about 1/3 cup) 
• 15 oz tub ricotta cheese
• 1 egg
• 10 oz package frozen chopped spinach, defrosted, water squeezed out
• 1 lb package shredded Mozzarella cheese
•  3/4 cup grated Italian hard cheese blend (like Parmesan, Asiago, Romano - whatever is on sale, I bought one small tub and used the whole tub for this and the topping ingredient which follows later)
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp dried basil
• 1 tsp dried parsley
• generous twists of fresh ground pepper
• 1/2  of 9 oz package no cook lasagna noodles

Topping

• 1/2 cup grated  Italian hard cheese blend (see above)

Spray crock with no stick spray.  Heat oil in skillet over medium high heat.  Saute onions until soft, then add minced garlic for a minute or two.  Turn off heat.  Add jar of marinara sauce to skillet. Add water to the empty jar to shake the sauce from edges of jar and add this mixture to the skillet.  Add package of frozen crumbles and stir.  In a bowl add all other ingredients except the lasagna noodles and topping. Mix well.  Ladle 1/4 of the sauce onto the bottom of the crock.  Break 2 no cook lasagna noodle sheets to form a layer covering the sauce in the crock, then layer evenly with 1/3 of the cheese mixture, followed by 1/3 of remaining sauce.  Repeat the noodle, cheese, sauce layers two times, ending with the sauce.  Top with the remaining grated hard cheese blend.  Cook on low for 4 hours.