Rainy Friday....

There is nothing that speaks more loudly to me on a rainy Friday than Italian, and this recipe for Skillet-style Lasagna certainly fits into THIS day!  Sorry that I forgot to take the picture before it was served.

The recipe comes from Country Home magazine,  the March 2008 issue.  I made some alterations as I prepared it for us, but the recipe listed below is the way it appears in the magazine.

Skillet-Style Lasagna

6 dried lasagna noodles, broken into 2 to 3-inch pieces
12 oz. bulk Italian sausage
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 medium zucchini, coarsely shredded (about 1 1/2 cups)
1 24 to 28-oz. jar mushroom pasta sauce or marinara sauce
1 cup light ricotta cheese (about 1/2 of a 15-oz. carton)
3/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese (3 oz.)
2 Tbsp. grated Parmesan or Romano cheese

Cook pasta according to package directions.  Drain thoroughly.  In a 10-inch skillet cook sausage and onion over medium heat until sausage is no longer pink, stirring to break up sausage as it cooks.  Add zucchini; cook and stir for 1 minute.  Drain off fat.  Remove meat mixture from skillet. In the same skillet arrange about half of the lasagna noodle pieces.  Cover with about half of the pasta sauce.  Spoon cooked meat mixture over sauce.  Spoon ricotta in mounds atop meat mixture and sprinkle with 1/4 cup of the mozzarella cheese.  Arrange remaining lasagna-noodle pieces atop cheese.  Top with remaining pasta sauce and mozzarella cheese.  Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese.  Cook, covered, over medium heat about 10 minutes or  until heated through and cheese is melted.  Remove skillet from heat.  Let stand, uncovered, for 5 minutes before serving.  Makes 6 servings.

I was able to find whole wheat lasagna noodles that didn't need precooking, and that is what I used.  They actually don't need to be broken into small pieces since the pieces are smaller than the lasagna noodles that require cooking. Also, I made this vegetarian, with no Italian sausage.  The zucchini was also diced from what I had frozen from our summer garden.  I  had fat-free ricotta cheese, and it worked very well in the recipe.

Enjoy!

Thank you for reading!