Viva Lasagna!

Oh hai!

Long time no blog.

Do I have an excuse? Not really. I have just been eating a lot of repeats over the past month or so and going out to eat more than I probably should. But I'm back baby! I'm back!

And what better way to celebrate coming back than with a huge vat of bubbly, cheesy, delicious low cal awesomeness.

Yeah I said cheesy. AND low cal. This lasagna recipe manages to taste like your traditional Full Fat Full Flavor dish but with so much less of the bad stuff and so much more of the good stuff. Like GARLIC. and PROSCIUTTO.

Instead of ricotta it blends herbs and garlic and cottage cheese and fat free cream cheese. And it's so good I just about ate it straight from the food processor, lasagna be damned. But I pulled it together and made the dish. For you, people. FOR YOU.

So take a gander at this awesome lasagna that weighs in at a perfectly acceptable 272 calories a serving. YEE HA.

Tomato-Basil Lasagna with Prosciutto
from Cooking Light
Makes 9 Servings

5 garlic cloves
1 (16-ounce) carton 1% low-fat cottage cheese
1/2 cup (4 ounces) block-style fat-free cream cheese
1/4 cup (1 ounce) grated fresh Romano cheese, divided
2 1/2 teaspoons dried basil
1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper
1 large egg
1 (26-ounce) bottle fat-free tomato-basil pasta sauce (such as Muir Glen)
Cooking spray
12 cooked lasagna noodles
1 cup (4 ounces) chopped prosciutto or ham
1 cup (4 ounces) shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese

Preheat oven to 375°.

Drop garlic into food processor while its running, and process until minced.

Add cottage cheese and process for about two minutes or until smooth. You can also use this trick as a base for more healthy dips! Just add your fave dip mix and voila.

But back to the dish. Add cream cheese, 2 tablespoons Romano, basil, pepper, and egg;

process until well-blended.

Now if you haven't already chopped your prosciutto there is an easy way to do it. Roll it into a cigar shape as tightly as you can and slice thinly with your knife. Then just run your knife through it a few more times and voila. An easy peasy way to chop persnickety prosciutto.

Spread half a cup of the pasta sauce in the bottom of a 13 x 9-inch baking dish coated with cooking spray. And arrange 3 noodles over the pasta sauce;

top with 1 cup cheese mixture

1/3 cup prosciutto

and 3/4 cup pasta sauce.

It looks like not enough prosciutto but the thing is it's SO flavorful, as long as you make sure you spread it out fairly evenly, each bite packs a delicious punch of perfectly salted meat.

Repeat the layers two times, ending with noodles. Spread remaining pasta sauce over noodles. Sprinkle with 2 tablespoons Romano and mozzarella.

Cover and bake at 375° for 45 minutes or until sauce is bubbly. Uncover and bake an additional 15 minutes. Let lasagna stand 5 minutes.

Ta Da!

Not only it is delicious and healthy BUT it reheats beautifully so you can make this on a Sunday and divvy it up for fabulous lunches for the rest of the week. Or have it for dinner later in the week. You can freeze it up to a month and then just defrost in the fridge and reheat in the oven.