Quick and Easy Vegetable Lasagne

I think we all know that cutting down our consumption of meat is a good thing.  Every week I make at least a couple of vegetarian meals.  You know what, I don’t think my hubby even realises that this vegetable lasagne recipe doesn’t have meat – so don’t tell him. ???

I have a range of quick and easy meals that are easy to make mid-week and beefy enough (without the beef) to satisfy the men in our lives that think they can’t live without it. Yes, I usually use mushrooms because he likes them, but there are so many choices out there these days, and there’s more on the way.

This vegetable lasagne recipe is so easy I don’t even have to write the method.  I’ve made you a series of pictures of how I do it.  If you struggle, let me know, and I’ll write it up, but I think you’ll get the idea from this.

Ingredients For Vegetable Lasagne

• Eggplant, small dice or slices
• Capsicum, small dice or slices
• A sprinkle of my Persian feta spice blend
• Onion, small dice or thinly sliced
• Mushroom, diced or thinly sliced. Take a look at king oyster mushrooms
• Zucchini, Use a peeler to get ribbons or slice
• Spinach, fresh or frozen
• Lasagna sheets, (instant)
• Bechamel, (white sauce) with Philly like I do, or try a cauliflower puree
• Melty cheese, (whatever you like)
• Serve with a garden salad

How to

Here are my top tips for making vegetable lasagne. 

• Use instant lasagne sheets for quick results. Put a layer of sheets between each veg layer.  Layer the veg thinly, so you can get those stacks up.
• You don’t need measurements, think about how large your lasagna dish is and how many you want to feed. I try to make sure I have enough veg to do each layer twice buy hey, if you have loads of veg why not use them up.
• Of course, you can put all your veg in raw, but if you fry up some of the veggies like onion or toast off the mushrooms so they brown a bit, you’ll have bags more flavour – it doesn’t take long.
• I know there are some mushroom haters out there, so you can swap out the mushrooms for something else like eggplant or sweet potato.  Choose something that will cook fast or Blanche the veg first.  For example, a potato will take much longer to cook through than mushrooms will.  Part cook them in a pot on the stove or microwave until they soften slightly.  Don’t overcook, or you’ll end up with mash.
• I always have cheese that’s suitable for pizza, so I usually sprinkle that on in the last few minutes of baking but adding it in between the layers is nice too.
• Bechamel, white sauce, or whatever you call it, is needed between the layers.  If you have a Thermomix it’s a no-brainer, just look up the Thermomix Everyday Cookbook Recipe, Check out Cookidoo or freestyle it using the TM6 Thicken Mode.  Regardless of the method, you might also try this tip. I love to make a white sauce and add a 1/2 a block of Philly to it near the end of cooking or even at the end is fine. Just mix to combine, oh the flavour 😉 As I said earlier, for extra flavour, you can add cheese between the layers too.  That is extra fat, though. ;-(
• I have used creamed cauliflower before in place of the Bechamel. It was great, but it doesn’t freeze well.
• I prefer ceramic or glass lasagne dishes to the metal variety. Metal will heat up the sides of your lasagne before cooking the centre in some cases.   Oval looks pretty but what shape are you sheets hmmm?  I had an oval one once – it drove me mad, and had to go!  There are so many dishes to choose from, inexpensive, to top of the range.  Oh, and I like a deeper dish too.  You may as well make a big batch, as it really doesn’t take much longer to prepare a big dish as it does a small, and only a little longer to bake off.

FAQ:

Want to know more?

If you love the idea of having instant flavour blends or spice blends, you might want to look at my eBooks.  I love these blends and use them every week.  They’re great when you’re not sure what to do for dinner.  I look in my fridge, see what I have, then choose a spice blend that will work.