Oh My Lord!!: Veggie Lasagna

Oh my Lord!!! Veggie Lasagna!!

Did you know that lasagna is absolutely amazing without red sauce and meat?

I will make this again over, and over, and over....

Move over Olive Garden!! I am stomping through with this amazing veggie lasagna.

And it is linked to:

AND:

Busy Vegetarian Mom ~ Foodie Friends Friday

When I served this for dinner, the very first comment I got was, "Oh my goodness, this is just like eating in a restaurant."

This was so easy to make. All I had to do was dump all of my layering ingredients into a bowl (sliced summer squash, purple onion, spinach, cheeses, and spices).

It sits in the bowl waiting to be layered in the lasagna.

Sliced tomatoes that surround the no boil noodles.

I have never used the no boil lasagna noodles before, because the traditional lasagna is so good, and I had no reason to try anything else.

Can you believe that statement just came from a cook? Me either....

The more I experiment, the more I like it.

You start with no boil noodles on the bottom of the baking dish.

Tomatoes on top of the noodles.

And then that mixture that's sitting in the bowl (lots of it....it cooks down).

More tomatoes, more noodles.....you just keep layering until the dish is heaping.

Top it with cheeses and bake for 40 - 45 minutes.

See, I told you it was easy.

And eating it is even more easy. I absolutely love this stuff.....

This is what it looked like right out of the oven. You will want to let it sit (I know it will be hard) for about 10 minutes to let the cheese set up.

And the aroma that was coming from my kitchen.....totally satisfying!!

I served this lasagna with naan bread and red wine. The perfect summer meal. And a perfect way to use some of those garden veggies.

Veggie Lasagna

1 med. yellow summer squash, washed and sliced

1/3 c. chopped red onion

1 (2 c.) package shredded mozzarella cheese, divided

1/2 c. crumbled feta cheese

4 c. fresh baby spinach

1/4 c. chopped fresh basil (I used dried)

1 TBS chopped fresh oregano (I used dried)

3 cloves garlic, minced

3 TBS olive oil

1/4 c. balsamic vinegar

1 tsp. sugar

1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. freshly ground black pepper

1 (8 oz.) package no-boil lasagna noodles (if you don't use them all, that's alright)

9 roma tomatoes, thinly sliced (I used my own garden tomatoes)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease a 9x9 baking dish.

In a large bowl, toss together the squash, spinach, garlic, red onion, 1/2 c. mozzarella cheese, and feta cheese. Drizzle with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and toss in basil, oregano, sugar, salt and pepper. Toss the mixture until evenly blended.

Place a layer of noodles into the bottom of the pan. Make a layer of tomato slices over the noodles. Spread a generous amount of the spinach mixture over the tomatoes. It shrinks down while cooking. Lay slices of tomatoes over the spinach mixture, then another layer of noodles. Start with another layer of tomatoes on top of the noodles, and repeat layering until the dish is heaped with lasagna, ending with the spinach mixture. Sprinkle remaining cheese on top (I sprinkled a little more feta on top.

Bake for 40 - 45 minutes, until noodles, and vegetables are tender. Let stand for about 10 minutes before cutting.

"Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But He said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.""

Corinthians 12:8-9

The most dangerous threat to any servant of Christ is spiritual pride. I confess to you, that is the thing I fear most in my life. Also another fear is, letting food compliments stroke my pride. There are so many boosts to my ego that I fear I will begin to believe that some of these compliments represent remarkable abilities that I posses.

This underscores the spiritual battle we are involved in. When is the devil being beaten? Not when we feel great and confident, when it looks like wonderful things are happening, when the cooking is going well. No, the devil is being defeated when we are feeling attacked and under the gun, when we feel weak and helpless and do not know what to do, when we are not sure how to respond, when in our confusions and sense of weakness we come before the Lord and plead with Him for strength to go on one more day and for grace to help us stand. That is when we are winning and when the kingdom of God is being spread more abundantly than ever before.

Can we receive our weakness and incompetence as a path to God's power at work in us?