My Eggplant Lasagna recipe, a.k.a How to Avoid Pizza Takeouts

Wednesdays are busy days around here. Take The Pea to school at 8AM, take 3Po and Jammy to school at noon. Work out, have lunch, fix up the house or run errands (or go shopping). On regular Wednesdays, pick The Pea up at 1:15 and the boys at 3. On Girl Scout Wednesdays, pick the boys up at 3 and The Pea at 3:30. Take the kids to skating lessons at 5PM (this time around neither of the boys wanted to take skating, so I didn't push them), arrive back home just before 7PM.

Dinner? Oh, right. Ummmm, canned soup ok? Last year I succumbed to the vice known as Little Caesar's $5 Hot-N-Ready Pizza waaay too many times. I'm trying to do better this year. I've started making dinner the night before (i.e. chicken salad or egg salad that we eat with greens and toast) or earlier in the day. This afternoon I threw together an eggplant lasagna. When we arrived home, exhausted and hungry, I simply reheated it and everyone devoured it.



1 medium eggplant, sliced thinly lengthwise
8 oz (approximately 2 pcs) italian sausage, cooked and crumbled
2 cups red pasta sauce (you can make this in advance or just use fresh tomato sauce or use bottled sauce -- hey, who am I to jugdge? I use the bottled stuff myself)
2 cups white pasta sauce (see comment above)
1 cup shredded cheese
1 box lasagna noodles, precooked (if you want to use no-boil lasagna noodles like I do, be sure to add more sauce or a bit of water, or soak the noodles in very hot water for 10 minutes before assembling -- otherwise the topmost layer of noodles will end up dry and chewy)

1) Spray a 13x9x3-inch baking dish with cooking spray (so it will be easy to clean afterwards!) and preheat your oven to 450F. Divide all ingredients equally into 4 groups.

2) Mix the sausage in with the red pasta sauce.

3) Layer the ingredients in the baking dish as follows: Red sauce, noodles, eggplant, white sauce, cheese. Repeat 4 times.

4) Cover the dish with aluminum foil and bake in the oven for 45-60 minutes.

There are so many ways to customize this basic lasagna recipe to make it healthier/more decadent/ kid-friendlier/ etc... (i.e. omit eggplant, substitute cooked ground beef for the sausage, eliminate white sauce, add shredded carrots, etc...). It sure beats doughy, oily cheese pizza. Enjoy!